Purpose: The objective of this study was to determine the presence and numbers of Cl. difficile in retail chicken meat parts and chicken liver samples using both qualitative and quantitative methods and to detect some genes such as tpi, tcdA, tcdB, cdtA and cdtB genes by PCR method.
Methods: A total of 310 chicken meat parts including leg quarter, breast, wing, drumstick and chicken liver samples were collected from supermarkets and butcher shops in two cities (Elazig and Diyarbakir) in Eastern Turkey. All samples were tested for the presence and numbers of Cl. difficile reported by Weese et al. (2009) with slight modifications. Multiplex PCR was performed to screen for tpi, tcdA, tcdB, cdtA and cdtB genes.
Results: Cl. difficile was isolated from 25 (8%) of 310 samples. The distribution of Cl. difficile in leg quarter, breast, wing, drumstick and liver samples were 12%, 8%, 6.6%, 5% and 7.5%, respectively. All of 25 Cl. difficile isolates were carried out tpi gene, of 32% tcdA and of 20% tcdB genes but none of isolates carried out cdtA or cdtB genes according to the PCR results.
Significance: This study is the first report of detection of tcdA and tcdB toxin genes in Cl. difficile isolated from chicken meats and liver in Turkey. Also, the present study showed that the number of Cl. difficile is low in retail chicken meat parts and liver, and it was isolated from the samples using the enrichment method except for one sample which had 20 spores/g.