Comparison between two standardized cultural methods and 24 hour Duplex SYBR Green Real-Time PCR assay for Salmonella detection in meat samples

Food-borne diseases caused by Salmonella represent a worldwide public health problem. Salmonella must be absent in an established amount depending on the kind of the product and usually cultural methods have to be applied to evaluate the compliance of the products. ISO 6579:2002 in Europe and FSIS MLG 4.04.:2008 in the USA have usually been employed to detect Salmonella in meat, poultry and egg products. A Real Time PCR method using probes has recently been validated against the NMKL (Nordic Committee on Food Analysis) standard method. This method has been modified using the less expensive Sybr Green Real Time PCR approach and applied directly in the 18 hours pre-enrichment broth for the purpose of detecting Salmonella in meat products in less than 24 hours. The purpose of this study was to: -compare the effectiveness of ISO and FSIS cultural methods; -develop a new 24 hour duplex Sybr Green Real Time PCR-melting curve analysis; -evaluate the performance of Salmonella, Standard Method, Rapid Method, SYBR Green Real Time PCR. The equivalence between ISO and FSIS methods was demonstrated and the use of SYBR Green Real Time PCR as a screening tool for negative results seems appealing especially to evaluate compliance with the HACCP systems.