Application of an optimized and highly discriminatory method based on arbitrarily primed PCR for epidemiologic analysis of methicillin-resistant Staphylococcus aureus nosocomial infections

The optimization of an arbitrarily primed PCR method for typing 96 methicillin-resistant Staphylococcus aureus (MRSA) isolates was compared with pulsed-field gel electrophoresis. Identical results in the differentiation of MRSA clones and identification of the main cluster that included 82 strains (88% of patients) were obtained by both techniques.