Korean J Dermatol.  1996 Apr;34(2):248-256.

Detection and Typing of Herpes Simplex Virus by Polymerase Chain Reaction

• Kim YH
• Jun JB
• Kim DW
• Chung SL
• Kim JC

Abstract

BACKGROUND: Herpes simplex virus(HSV) infections are very common viral illnesses in dermatology and they have shown a tendency to increase in prevalence and incidence, and they would seem to have become more prevalent recently. This has resulted in an increased need for the rapid diagnosis of these infections. It has also become important to recognize the types of HSV in the clinical setting, because the two types differ in their natural histories and prognoses.
OBJECTIVE
The purpose of this study is to detect and type HSV DNA by polymerase chain reaction (PCR) and restriction fragment length polymorphism (RFLP). We investigated the relationship between the clinical manifestations and type using PCR.
METHODS
The study population consisted of 40 cases of HSV infections and 10 cases of varicella-zoster virus infections as negative controls. We used a pair of primers designated by Sakaoka et. al and performed restriction analysis after PCR.
RESULTS
No specific amplification was observed using the varicella-zoster virus. A total of 40 patients were examined by PCR and 28 were positive. Of 17 patients with lesions which developed above the umbilicus, l0 were positive. Out of 8 patients with lesions below the umbilicus, 5 were positive. Virus genomes were detected in the 13 out of 15 patients with eczema herpeticum.
CONCLUSION
The method used in this study is useful in differentiating HSV-1 from HSV-2 in fections. These data suggest that the PCR results were nearly consistent with the clinical manifestations.

Keyword

Herpes simplex virus; Polymerase chain reaction; Restriction analysis

MeSH Terms

Dermatology
Diagnosis
DNA
Genome
Herpes Simplex*
Herpesvirus 1, Human
Herpesvirus 2, Human
Herpesvirus 3, Human
Humans
Incidence
Kaposi Varicelliform Eruption
Polymerase Chain Reaction*
Polymorphism, Restriction Fragment Length
Prevalence
Prognosis
Simplexvirus*
Umbilicus
DNA