title: Distribution of Bartonella henselae variants in patients, reservoir hosts and vectors in Spain.
abstract: We have studied the diversity of B. henselae circulating in patients, reservoir hosts and vectors in Spain. In total, we have fully characterized 53 clinical samples from 46 patients, as well as 78 B. henselae isolates obtained from 35 cats from La Rioja and Catalonia (northeastern Spain), four positive cat blood samples from which no isolates were obtained, and three positive fleas by Multiple Locus Sequence Typing and Multiple Locus Variable Number Tandem Repeats Analysis. This study represents the largest series of human cases characterized with these methods, with 10 different sequence types and 41 MLVA profiles. Two of the sequence types and 35 of the profiles were not described previously. Most of the B. henselae variants belonged to ST5. Also, we have identified a common profile (72) which is well distributed in Spain and was found to persist over time. Indeed, this profile seems to be the origin from which most of the variants identified in this study have been generated. In addition, ST5, ST6 and ST9 were found associated with felines, whereas ST1, ST5 and ST8 were the most frequent sequence types found infecting humans. Interestingly, some of the feline associated variants never found on patients were located in a separate clade, which could represent a group of strains less pathogenic for humans.
authors.affiliation: Centro Nacional de Microbiología, Instituto de Salud Carlos III, Majadahonda, Madrid, Spain. hgil@isciii.es
authors.forename: Horacio
authors.initials: H
authors.lastname: Gil
authors.forename: Raquel
authors.initials: R
authors.lastname: Escudero
authors.forename: Inmaculada
authors.initials: I
authors.lastname: Pons
authors.forename: Manuela
authors.initials: M
authors.lastname: Rodríguez-Vargas
authors.forename: Coral
authors.initials: C
authors.lastname: García-Esteban
authors.forename: Isabel
authors.initials: I
authors.lastname: Rodríguez-Moreno
authors.forename: Cristina
authors.initials: C
authors.lastname: García-Amil
authors.forename: Bruno
authors.initials: B
authors.lastname: Lobo
authors.forename: Félix
authors.initials: F
authors.lastname: Valcárcel
authors.forename: Azucena
authors.initials: A
authors.lastname: Pérez
authors.forename: Santos
authors.initials: S
authors.lastname: Jiménez
authors.forename: Isabel
authors.initials: I
authors.lastname: Jado
authors.forename: Ramón
authors.initials: R
authors.lastname: Juste
authors.forename: Ferrán
authors.initials: F
authors.lastname: Segura
authors.forename: Pedro
authors.initials: P
authors.lastname: Anda
mesh_terms: D000818:Animals; D001474:Bartonella Infections; D018416:Bartonella henselae / Q000145:classification* / Q000235:genetics* / Q000302:isolation & purification; D002372:Cat-Scratch Disease; D002415:Cats; D058251:Ctenocephalides / Q000382:microbiology; D004197:Disease Reservoirs / Q000382:microbiology*; D004199:Disease Vectors; D006801:Humans; D018598:Minisatellite Repeats; D058885:Multilocus Sequence Typing; D010802:Phylogeny; D058974:Phylogeography; D013030:Spain