Occurrence and Clinical Relevance of Mycobacterium chimaera sp. nov., Germany

Abstract

Retrospective molecular genetic analysis of 166 Mycobacterium intracellulare isolates showed that 143 (86%) strains could be assigned to Mycobacterium chimaera sp. nov. Of 97 patients from whom M. chimaera sp. nov. was isolated, only 3.3% exhibited mycobacterial lung disease, whereas all M. intracellulare isolates caused severe pulmonary infections.

Keywords

• Mycobacterium avium complex
• Mycobacterium avium-intracellulare infection
• atypical mycobacterium infections
• high-performance liquid chromatography
• ribosomal DNA
• ribosomal spacer DNA