The identification of salmonella infection in commercial poultry has been one of the strong points of prophylaxis and consequent reduction of salmonellosis outbreaks in humans associated to consumption of eggs, considering that the analysis of the eggs can be one more point of detection of infection, which for many times appear without clinical signs. The Polymerase Chain Reaction (PCR) seems to be a useful strategy for Salmonella detection, because various authors have used the PCR to verify the presence of bacteria in meat, feces, tissues, blood, milk and eggs, with different methods of manipulation of samples. We have analyzed 360 eggs from ten farms, producers of free range-eggs, in the district of Camobi, in Santa Maria - RS - Brasil. The eggs were grouped in pools of six, totaling sixty samples. The bacteriological exam was done in compliance with the method preconized by the technical rules and the method for extraction of DNA was by phenol-chloroform. The PCR was performed for the amplification of a 284 bp DNA fragment. The analysis of the results do not show significant difference between the PCR and the bacteriological exam. All positive samples in the bacteriological exam were also positive by PCR, however the PCR detected more two samples due to higher sensitivity and specificity, specially when it is known that the eggs show a mixed population of germs that many times difficult isolation of salmonellas in the bacteriological exam because of the competition with normal flora bacteria.
Salmonellas; free-range eggs; PCR
