THE USE OF MOLECULAR TECHNIQUES IN THE EPIDEMIOLOGY AND CONTROL OF INFECTIOUS-DISEASES

The ability to identify strains within species of microorganisms is important to the development of measures to prevent and control nosocomial infections. The efforts of both microbiologists and epidemiologists are facilitated greatly by the availability of the newer molecular epidemiologic typing methods. Although these methods have limitations, they are a significant improvement over the more conventional phenotypic typing methods. Based on current experience, the molecular typing methods that appear to be the most practical and useful for both large and small scale epidemiologic studies are the DNA-based methods such as pulsed-field gel electrophoresis among others.