Clostridioides difficile ribotypes isolated from domestic environment and from patients in Bangladesh.

Clostridioides difficile infection (CDI) is an emerging but often understudied infectious disease in developing countries. This study was aimed to isolate and characterize C. difficile from shoe sole swabs and diarrheal patient's stool samples in Bangladesh. We collected 94 shoe sole swabs samples from urban communities in Dhaka and 208 diarrheal stool samples from hospitalized patients over a period of 4 months. Samples were incubated anaerobically for C. difficile growth, confirmed toxigenic, and PCR-ribotyped. Eleven of 94 (11.7%) shoe sole swabs and 4 of 208 (1.9%) stool samples were culture positive of which 9 shoe sole isolates were toxigenic. Six PCR ribotypes from the 9 toxigenic isolates were identified with ribotype F014-020 being the most common (n = 4; 44%). The recently identified ribotype 106 strain was also identified. To the best of our knowledge, this is the first report of C. difficile culture, isolation and characterization from environmental sources in Bangladesh. • Around 10% of shoe swab samples were positive for toxigenic C. difficile. • Four out of 208 patients with diarrhea were positive for non-toxigenic C. difficile. • Ribotype F014-020 was the predominant ribotype among toxigenic C. difficile. • Shoe sole sampling might be useful method for environmental surveillance of C. difficile. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]