A Comparison between Hippurate Hydrolysis and Multiplex PCR for Differentiating Campylobacter coli and Campylobacter jejuni

Species identification is important for epidemiological, clinical and treatment purposes. The aim of this study was to find out whether hippurate hydrolysis is a reliable test for differentiating between Campylobacter coli and Campylobacter jejuni. To achieve this, hippurate hydrolysis test was compared with multiplex Polymerase Chain Reaction (mPCR) for their ability to speciate C. coli and C. jejuni. Eighteen Campylobacter strains from poultry samples were used for this study. The results from 17 of the 18 strains were in agreement with both methods. Thus, the hippurate hydrolysis test can be used for distinguishing C. jejuni from C. coli although occasionally some strains of C. jejuni may be mis-identified as C. coli.