AIM: To examine the detection rate of viable Mycobacterium avium subspecies paratuberculosis (MAP) in patients with inflammatory bowel disease [Crohn’s disease (CD) and ulcerative colitis (UC)].

METHODS: Thirty patients with CD (15 with at least one NOD2/CARD15 mutation), 29 with UC, and 10 with no inflammatory bowel disease (IBD). were tested for MAP by polymerase chain reaction (specific IS900 fragment) and blood culture.

RESULTS: MAP DNA was detected in all original blood samples and 8-wk blood cultures (CD, UC and non-IBD). Positive MAP DNA status was confirmed by dot blot assays. All 69 cultures were negative by acid-fast Ziehl-Neelsen staining. Viable MAP, in spheroplast form, was isolated from the 18-mo blood cultures of all 30 CD patients, one UC patient, and none of the non-IBD controls. No association was found between positive MAP cultures and use of immunosuppressive drugs or CD-associated single nucleotide polymorphisms.

CONCLUSION: MAP is widely present in our area and MAP DNA can be recovered from the blood of CD, UC and non-IBD patients. However, MAP spheroplasts were only found in CD patients.

Crohn’s disease (CD) and ulcerative colitis (UC) are two related chronic remitting and relapsing inflammatory diseases of the gastrointestinal tract, commonly known as inflammatory bowel disease (IBD). Although the causes of IBD are unknown, it is thought that inflammation results from inappropriate chronic activation of the innate and adaptive mucosal immune systems in a genetically susceptible host, and that enteric microflora play a central role in initiation and maintenance of disease[1]. Some investigators have postulated that some mycobacterial infections are involved in development of CD, based on the similarities between CD and intestinal tuberculosis[2]. Mycobacterium avium subspecies paratuberculosis (MAP) has the specific ability to cause chronic bowel inflammation of a number of histopathological types in many animals, including primates[3,4]. Systematic review and meta-analysis of research from many laboratories have shown a significant and specific association between MAP infection and chronic bowel inflammation of the CD type in humans[5,6]. Recently, Naser et al[7] have found viable MAP in the peripheral blood from 50% of CD patients.

Several findings suggest that the presence of certain bacteria in the face of permissive NOD2/CARD15 mutations is necessary for development of CD and provides evidence for a pathogen-host interaction[8-10]. A recent study has demonstrated an association in IBD with a coding variant of ATG16L, IL-23R[11] and IRGM[12] genes, thereby implicating the autophagy pathway that is crucial in inhibiting Mycobacterium tuberculosis survival in infected macrophages[13].

The aim of this study was to examine, after stratifying CD patients based on the presence or absence of the well-established NOD2/CARD15 mutations, the culture detection rate of viable MAP in peripheral blood from patients with IBD (CD and UC) and healthy controls (non-IBD).

The group of 30 CD patients consisted of 11 men and 19 women. Median age at diagnosis was 27 years (mean: 31, range: 14-48 years). Median follow-up duration was 7 years (mean: 8, range: 6-9 years). Table 1 shows the characteristics of the 30 CD and 29 UC patients enrolled into this study.

MAP DNA was detected in all original blood samples. No PCR internal control was positive for MAP DNA, which indicated no laboratory contamination. Nucleotide sequencing of purified MAP DNA fragments was also positive in the second round of nested PCR, which confirmed amplification of the IS900 nucleotide sequence (Table 2).

After 8 wk incubation (bottle I), no mycobacterial growth was automatically detected in the 69 BACTEC MGTI cultures.

Dot blot assays confirmed the positive MAP status of all original blood samples and 8-wk cultures.

After 18 mo incubation (bottle II), no mycobacterial growth was automatically detected in the 69 BACTEC MGTI cultures. All 69 buffy coat cultures were negative by acid-fast Ziehl-Neelsen staining. However, all of the 30 18-mo cultures from CD patients were positive by phenolic acridine orange staining, which suggested the presence of wall-deficient cells or spheroplasts (Figure 1).

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Figure 1 Microscopic examination of Mycobacterium avium subspecies paratuberculosis cultures isolated from blood of patients with Crohn’s disease. Phenolic-acridine orange techniques to detect cell-wall-deficient Mycobacterium avium subspecies paratuberculosis [spheroplasts (arrow)].

Thus, 18-mo blood cultures were MAP-positive in all CD patients. No association could be found between positive cultures and use of tumor necrosis factor (TNF)-α antibodies and thiopurine drugs. No correlation was seen between MAP-positive blood cultures and CARD15/NOD2, ATG16L1, IGRM or IL-23R CD-associated single nucleotide polymorphisms (SNPs).

In this study, nested IS900-specific PCR showed that MAP DNA is widespread in our environment. Original blood samples and 8-wk cultures from all CD and UC patients and non-IBD controls were PCR-positive. However, viable MAP spheroplasts (cell-wall-deficient forms) were only found in the 18-mo blood cultures from all CD and one UC patient, but in none of the non-IBD controls. The observation that MAP could be cultured from CD patients was not correlated with use of immunosuppressive drugs (TNF-α antibodies and thiopurine drugs), NOD2/CARD15 mutations, or other studied genes, which implicated the autophagy pathway of the innate immune system (ATG 16L1, IRGM, IL-23R).

The equal circulation of MAP DNA in patients with and without IBD lends support to the contention that environmental exposure to MAP is widespread, possibly from water, milk, or other sources[2]. Our group of subjects with no IBD was recruited from the staff of the Department of Microbiology, Hospital Clinico San Carlos de Madrid, Spain. These healthy subjects were most likely colonized by MAP, but none of them showed detection of viable MAP in 18-mo blood cultures. This result supported the findings in the study by Naser et al[7], where no viable MAP was subsequently cultured from any of the IS900-positive samples from healthy controls. The same occurred with the blood cultures from UC patients, as viable MAP was detected in only one of them. Thus, in our area, MAP is an ubiquitous environmental organism that does not usually cause disease unless the host is predisposed to infection, as occurs with other members of the M. avium complex.

Previous studies have shown that reliable and reproducible detection of MAP by PCR tests applied directly to DNA extracted from human tissue and other samples is extremely difficult. Use of suboptimal sample processing procedures results in false-negative results[19]. Results of MAP detection using nucleic-acid-based techniques have recently been reported in two meta-analyses that have suggested that there is adequate evidence for the presence of MAP in the bowel of CD patients, regardless of whether these patients are compared to subjects with no IBD or those with UC[5,20]. However, this association remains controversial and inconclusive. PCR data can be criticized on the grounds that the procedure assesses DNA that might come from live bacteria or merely be scattered debris from killed organisms, and therefore of questionable biological consequence[21].

The gold standard for detection of MAP is based on isolation of the organism using culture methods. However, this method is time-consuming because of the fastidious nature and slow growth, and pleomorphic, variably acid-fast and spheroplast-like organisms. Chiodini et al[15] have demonstrated that MAP strains isolated from CD tissue first appeared as cell-wall-deficient forms (spheroplasts), and have suggested that MAP is present in CD tissue in a spheroplast-like form[15,22]. We could not detect viable MAP by acid-fast Ziehl-Neelsen staining, but all cultures from CD patients were shown to contain spheroplasts. Naser et al[7] have reported that the MAP-positive cultures of the buffy coat were negative by acid-fast Ziehl-Neelsen staining during the early weeks of culture incubation but were positive by acridine orange (spheroplast), but this observation has not been confirmed by other studies[23-25]. Therefore, MAP spheroplasts might play a role in development of CD, as well as in paucibacillary forms of Johne’s disease in other species. It has not been determined whether the presence of MAP in CD is related to infection, colonization, or a defect in the intestinal barrier/microbial killing. We did not study MAP in intestinal tissue, nor explore the possibility of increased bowel permeability. However, detection of viable MAP in the blood of CD patients could be due to the inability of macrophages in CD to kill MAP[26].

No association was found between a positive MAP culture from the blood of CD patients and CARD15/NOD2, ATG16L1, IRGM or IL-23R CD-associated SNPs, but our sample was small and a type II error cannot be excluded.

The most irrefutable evidence that a microbial agent causes a disease is long-term remission of clinical manifestations and a change in the natural history of disease after clearance of infection. Recently, a large, well-designed, randomized, placebo-controlled trial of clarithromycin, rifabutin, and ethambutol failed to show a sustained response in CD patients, although a short-term benefit of antibiotics at 16 wk, additional to the effect of corticosteroid therapy, was reported[27]. A recent study[28] has shown that antimycobacterial and thiopurine drugs used in concert might have an interactive effect. The apparently bacteriostatic effects of 6-mercaptopurine on M. paratuberculosis renders the organism less susceptible to the bactericidal effects of antibiotics.

An argument against a role of MAP in CD is that if CD were a chronic mycobacterial infection, immunosuppressive therapies would be associated with increased rates and severity of mycobacterial disease, rather than with improvement[29]. We were not able to show any association between occurrence of MAP bacteremia and use of immunosuppressive drugs, because all CD patients showed positive MAP cultures. Viable MAP could not be cultured from UC patients who received immunosuppressive therapy. This might indicate that use of immunosuppressive therapy has no influence on the presence of viable MAP in blood.

In conclusion, MAP is widely present in our area and MAP DNA can be recovered from the blood of CD and UC and healthy controls. Spheroplasts were only found in the blood cultures from CD patients. However, the pathogenetic role of MAP remains controversial and inconclusive. However, even if MAP is not causally related to CD, the presence of viable MAP in the blood might have secondary clinical implications.