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Journal of Clinical Microbiology, January 2002, p. 84-88, Vol. 40, No. 1
0095-1137/02/$04.00+0 DOI: 10.1128/JCM.40.1.84-88.2002
Copyright © 2002, American Society for Microbiology. All Rights Reserved.
Department of Public Health, Niigata University, School of Medicine,1 Division of Pharmacy, Niigata University Hospital, Niigata City, Niigata, 951-8510, Japan2
Received 16 May 2001/ Returned for modification 1 July 2001/ Accepted 17 October 2001
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Amantadine was approved for influenza virus treatment in Japan in 1998, and sales then increased suddenly. In our earlier study, we found a high frequency of resistant strains in nursing homes using the 50% tissue culture infective dose (TCID50)/0.2-ml titration method with isolated viruses and showed predominant amino acid substitutions at position 31 (serine to asparagine [Ser-31-Asn]) in the M2 protein of resistant viruses (15). However, the number of viruses examined was limited, and the correlation between indications of use and extent of resistant virus appearance was not clear.
In this report, we present a method to detect the resistant strains with substitutions at three positions (amino acids 27, 30, and 31), using PCR-restriction fragment length polymorphism (PCR-RFLP) analysis, which enables direct analysis of nasopharyngeal swabs from patients. Furthermore, we present data on incidences of amantadine-resistant strains in eight nursing homes, with a correlation between frequency and indications for therapy, namely, Parkinsons disease or influenza A virus infections.
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Viruses. As reference viruses, we used amantadine-resistant viruses which have been produced through serial (three to five) passages of sensitive strains in the presence of amantadine (2.0 µg/ml) in vitro and also verified by partial nucleotide sequence analysis of the viral M2 gene (15). The amino acid changes are valine to alanine at position 27 (Val-27-Ala), alanine to threonine at position 30 (Ala-30-Thr), and serine to asparagine at position 31 (Ser-31-Asn).
One hundred microliters of supernatant of nasopharyngeal swabs from patients with ILI was inoculated into Madin-Darby canine kidney (MDCK) cells for virus culture. An amantadine susceptibility test was done with two series of 10-fold dilution of virus from a cytopathic effect-positive culture, plated in triplicate in a 96-well microplate on MDCK cells, with one dilution series containing amantadine (2.0 µg/ml) in the medium (15). Amantadine-resistant strains were identified when a <2.0-fold difference in log TCID50/0.2-ml titer was observed with and without the drug after 48 h of inoculation. Subtyping of influenza viruses using hemagglutinin type-specific antisera was also performed.
Extraction of viral RNA. Viral RNA was extracted from patients nasopharyngeal swabs or supernatants of culture medium where viruses were inoculated, and 100-µl samples were mixed with 500 µl of TRIzol (GIBCO BRL, Life Technologies, Rockville, Md.) and 100 µl of chloroform. After incubation for 5 min at room temperature, the mixtures were centrifuged for separation of RNA from the upper aqueous phase. RNA was precipitated with 100% isopropanol at room temperature for 10 min and then purified by ether extraction.
Reverse transcription and cDNA synthesis. RNA pellets were resuspended in 11 µl of RNase-free sterile distilled water; mixed with 5 µl of 5x first-strand buffer (GIBCO BRL, Life Technologies), 1 µl (each) of 2.5 mM deoxynucleoside triphosphate (Promega, Madison, Wis.), 2 µl of 0.1 mM dithiothreitol (GIBCO BRL, Life Technologies), 1 µl of Random Primers (Promega), 1 µl of RNase inhibitor (GIBCO BRL, Life Technologies), and 1 µl of Moloney murine leukemia virus reverse transcriptase (GIBCO BRL, Life Technologies); and incubated at 37°C for 1 h for cDNA synthesis.
PCR-RFLP analysis. We developed a method to detect single-amino-acid changes at three sites (positions 27, 30, and 31) in the 27 amino acids spanning the transmembrane domain in the M2 protein, directly from nasopharyngeal swabs, using PCR-RFLP analysis.
Oligonucleotide primers. The primers (GIBCO BRL, Life Technologies) were selected for the highly conserved M2 protein region of the known influenza virus genomes, using available primer-designing computer programs (Primer 3; Whitehead Institute for Biomedical Research). The product amplified by the forward primer, M2-For3 (5'-CTAGTCAGGCCAGGCAAATG-3'), and the reverse primer, M2-Rev (5'-ACTGTCGTCAGCATCCACAG-3'), in the first PCR was 339 nucleotides. We designed three specific nested PCR primer sets and selected corresponding endonucleases for three single-amino-acid changes in M2 (Table 1). GenBank analysis showed that the restriction site for nuclease BspLu11I, which cleaves within the region encoding amino acid 27, amplified by sense M2-27For (incorporating two mismatched bases at positions 25 and 26) and antisense M2-Rev2, is present in all registered M2 segments of drug-sensitive epidemic viruses. The same is also the case for the restriction site for endonuclease HhaI, which cleaves within the region encoding amino acid 30, amplified by sense M2-For4 and antisense M2-30Rev (incorporating one mismatched nucleotide at position 31), and for endonuclease ScaI, which cleaves within the region encoding amino acid 31, amplified by sense M2-For5 and antisense M2-31 (incorporating two mismatched nucleotides at position 32). If single nucleotide changes which confer resistance appear in the triplet coding for amino acids 27 (from GTT to GCT) or 30 (from GCG to ACG or GTG) or 31 (from AGT to AAT), the respective cleavage sites disappear and double-stranded DNA becomes insensitive to the endonucleases.
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TABLE 1. Nested primersa used for RFLP analysis in genotyping of substitutions in the transmembrane domain of the M2 protein of amantadine-resistant strains
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PCR-RFLP analysis. Each 5-µl aliquot of nested PCR product was treated with specific endonucleases. These amplified with M2-27For and M2-Rev2 were digested with 5 U of BspLu11I (Roche Diagnostics GmbH, Mannheim, Germany) for 2 h at 48°C in 1.5 µl of buffer recommended by the manufacturer and 8.0 µl of sterile distilled water. Those amplified by M2-For4 and M2-30Rev, or M2-For5 and M2-31, were digested with 5 U of HhaI (Takara Biomedicals, Ohtsu, Japan) or ScaI (New England Biolabs, Beverly, Mass.), for 2 h at 37°C, respectively, with the same mixture ratio of buffer to distilled water. The digested samples were analyzed by electrophoresis using 4% agarose X gels (Nippon Gene, Tokyo, Japan) containing ethidium bromide. The restriction fragments were separated in 0.5x Tris-borate-EDTA buffer at 100 V for 30 min and examined by transillumination before being photographed. A 50-bp DNA ladder (Promega) was used as the standard molecular size marker.
Nucleotide sequencing. We confirmed the results by direct sequencing of the nested PCR products with a Thermo Sequenase Cy5.5 Terminator sequencing kit (Amersham Pharmacia Biotech, Piscataway, N.J.), using an automated Gene Rapid sequencer (Amersham Pharmacia Biotech). Amantadine-resistant viruses with substitutions at position 27, 30, or 31 in the M2 protein were compared with the corresponding codons on the reverse complement of the sequence obtained from known sensitive and resistant isolates (15).
Statistical analysis. All statistical analyses were performed using the Epi Info program (6.04b; Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, Atlanta, Ga.). A P of <0.05 was regarded as statistically significant.
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FIG. 1. PCR-RFLP analysis of amantadine-resistant reference viruses. Each aliquot of 5 µl of reverse transcription-PCR product, amplified by specific nested primer sets, was treated with 5 U of BspLu11I (A) at 48°C for 2 h and HhaI (B) or ScaI (C) at 37°C for 2 h, respectively, and then electrophoresed in 4% agarose X gels. Lanes: S, amantadine-sensitive virus without substitution; 27, 30, and 31, and strains having amantadine resistance substitutions at amino acids 27, 30, and 31 of the M2 protein, respectively; M, 50-bp molecular size marker.
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Clinical nasopharyngeal swabs. With regard to the above-mentioned 12 samples, we compared PCR-RFLP patterns of samples from isolated viruses and directly from nasopharyngeal swabs (Fig. 2). Eight resistant strains all showed the same Ser-31-Asn pattern, and four sensitive strains showed sensitive patterns by both methods.
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FIG. 2. Representative result of PCR-RFLP analysis of amantadine-resistant strains directly from nasopharyngeal swabs. Aliquots of 5 µl of nested PCR product were treated with 5 U of ScaI at 37°C for 2 h and then electrophoresed in 4% agarose X gel. Lanes: S, amantadine-sensitive virus without mutations; 30 and 31, strains having amantadine resistance substitutions at amino acids 30 and 31 of the M2 protein, respectively; M, 50-bp molecular size marker.
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TABLE 2. Frequency of resistant strains among residents in eight nursing homes in the 19981999 season, Niigata Prefecture, Japan
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Influenza outbreaks occurred at four of eight nursing homes. The vaccine strain matched strains circulating during the study period, but the influenza outbreaks tended to occur in nursing homes with low vaccination rates. Amantadine was used for influenza therapy in three of these facilities, but the outbreaks did not subside (Table 2). The incidences of resistant viruses did not demonstrate significant differences between facilities with or without outbreaks: 27 of 109 (24.8%) and 7 of 31 (21.9%), respectively. There was no evidence of outbreaks solely due to resistant strains.
Amantadine was administered mainly for influenza therapy in facilities A to D, where 27 (27.6%) out of 98 PCR positives had resistant patterns (Table 2). On the other hand, the drug was used only for Parkinsons disease in facilities E to H, where 7 (16.3%) of 43 PCR-positive samples were resistant. The frequency of resistant viruses was thus higher in the former, although without statistical significance.
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Our earlier report indicated the efficacy of the TCID50/0.2-ml titration method with isolated viruses (15), although the virus detection rate by tissue culture was less sensitive than that by PCR. In this study, we could isolate only 12 viruses (5%) from 246 samples, but we identified 141 PCR-positive samples (57%). Carman et al. also reported that virus isolation was less than half as sensitive as PCR in detecting influenza virus in the elderly (2). The difference in our study occurred in some samples because detection of influenza virus was improved in PCR when sampling was done during periods of low viral load in the upper respiratory tract and in others because viability of the virus may have been lost during transport and processing of samples.
With low virus isolation rates, we need to develop a sensitive and rapid laboratory method. The PCR-RFLP genotyping method reported by Klimov et al. is quite useful but requires virus isolation and costly endonucleases (13). We therefore developed a PCR-RFLP analysis to distinguish resistant viruses, focusing on amino acid substitutions at positions 27, 30, and 31, using inexpensive and commercially available endonucleases. The advantage of our approach is that we can detect amantadine-resistant strains directly from patients nasopharyngeal swabs in as little as 8 h. The outcomes demonstrated a good match between phenotyping by TCID50/0.2-ml titration and genotyping by the PCR-RFLP method and amino acid sequencing, indicating utility for screening for resistant strains in the clinical field.
Since a thorough literature search and our previous report indicated that 70 to 80% of substitutions in amantadine-resistant viruses occur at position 31 (Ser to Asn) and that around 10% each are found at positions 27 (Val to Ala) and 30 (Ala to Thr or Ala to Val) (1, 6, 8, 9, 1215, 18), we focused on these three genotypes with our RFLP method, covering over 90% of amino acid changes in resistant viruses. The reason why these particular genotypes are frequent is unknown.
The overall frequency of resistant viruses in eight nursing homes in Niigata Prefecture in the season of 1998 to 1999 was 24.1%, with the predominant substitution at position 31. In a previous report, up to approximately one-third of patients shed resistant viruses when amantadine or rimantadine was used for therapy (8). We found roughly 80% of patients who shed amantadine-resistant-pattern viruses did not have a history of the drug administration. Two patients shed resistant-pattern strains on the same day that the therapy started. We could not confirm whether the samples were collected before or after the actual administration, but the duration was too short for replacement of sensitive with resistant viruses, so transmission from other patients can be assumed. These findings suggest frequent transmission of resistant viruses among nursing home residents as they stay in closed communal settings.
In the present study, resistant viruses could be recovered not only from the facilities where the drug was used for influenza therapy but also after application for Parkinsons disease. Interestingly, the proportions of resistant viruses between the two groups did not show statistical difference. In an earlier study, we encountered resistant strains in nursing homes where the drug was used for Parkinsons disease (15), but the number was too limited to perform statistical analysis.
We strongly support the recommendations of the Advisory Committee on Immunization Practices to prevent the potential transmission of drug-resistant virus during institutional outbreaks (3). Measures should be taken to reduce contact as much as possible between persons taking and not taking antiviral drugs for treatment or chemoprophylaxis. Furthermore, we also suggest that persons taking amantadine for neurological indications should be included when such measures are taken.
In conclusion, the present investigation provided clear evidence that resistant influenza virus strains were circulating in nursing homes at a high frequency in Japan. While there appears to be no need to change existing recommendations for the use of amantadine, we request that a nationwide monitoring system be established to survey the appearance of resistant influenza A virus in such facilities.
We thank the research team for their hard work, K. Kamimura, I. Terada, K. Kameyama, A. Sumi, K. Saito, K. Yeda, O. Sekine, Y. Oguma, M. Ohnishi, and T. Saito; all the health care workers who took part in the studies in nursing homes in Niigata Prefecture; M. Nishikawa and M. Sasagawa for their technical and scientific advice on influenza diagnosis; the staff of Denka Seiken Co., Ltd., for scientific discussions; and A. Watanabe and S. Aida for their excellent laboratory assistance.
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