Updates on Clostridium difficile in Europe

Dr.P.Mastrantonio has served till 2015 as research director in the Department of Infectious, Parasitic and Immune-mediated Diseases of the Italian National Institute of Health (ISS). She completed her studies in Biological Sciences at the University of Rome “La Sapienza”, Italy. She has been worked in the field of clinical bacteriology at ISS where she was appointed Director of the Laboratory of Gastroenteric and Neurologic Bacterial Diseases. In particular, she has been involved in international study groups on Clostridium difficile contributing to European surveillance studies to monitor the epidemiology of C.difficile infection. She was Executive Committee member of the ESCMID Study Group on C. difficile (ESGCD) and was appointed by the Italian Ministry of Health as National Microbiological Focal Point at the European Centre for Disease Prevention and Control (ECDC) in Stockholm.  Dr. M. Rupnik is professorof Microbiology at Medical faculty, University of Maribor, and Head of Department for Microbiological Research at National laboratory for health, environment and food (NLZOH) in Maribor, Slovenia. She completed University studies and PhD at Biotechnical Faculty, University of Ljubljana. Her research is focused on molecular epidemiology of C. difficile and lately also on gut microbiota and NGS applications in clinical microbiology. She is von Humboldt fellow, has obtained ECCMID award for Advances in Clinical Microbiology and Slovenian national award for exceptional scientific achievements. She was a member of ESGCD Executive board and is serving as President of series of ICDS meetings (International C. difficile Symposium).

• Foreword (P. Mastrantonio and M. Rupnik).- Economic burden of CDI in European countries (E. Reigadas and E. Bouza).- The need for European surveillance of CDI(C. Wiuff, A.Lan Banks, F. Fitzpatrick, L. Cottom).- Diagnostic guidance for C. difficile infections (M.J.T. Crobach,A.Baktash, N. Duszenko, E.J. Kuijper).- Ribotypes and new virulent strains across Europe (J. Couturier, K. Davies, C. Gateau, F. Barbut).- Comparative genomics of C. difficile strains (S. Janezic, J.R.Garneau, M. Monot).- Cellular uptake and mode-of-action of Clostridium difficile toxins (P.Papatheodorou, H. Barth, N. Minton, K. Aktories).- Clostridium difficile biofilm (C. Vuotto, G. Donelli, A. Buckley, C. Chilton).- European practice for CDI treatment (F. Fitzpatrick, M. Skally, M. Brady, K. Burns,C. Rooney, M.H. Wilcox).- Antibiotic resistances of Clostridium difficile (P. Spigaglia, P. Mastrantonio, F. Barbanti).- Probiotics for prevention and treatment of Clostridium difficile infection (L. Valdés-Varela, M. Gueimonde, P. Ruas-Madiedo).- Faecal microbiota transplantation as emerging treatment in European countries (M. Maida, J. McIlroy, G. Ianiro, G. Cammarota).- Immunization strategies against Clostridium difficile (J.F. Bruxelle, S. Péchiné, A. Collignon).- Non-human C. difficile reservoirs and sources: animals, food, environment (C. Rodriguez Diaz, C. Seyboldt , M. Rupnik).- The ESCMIDStudy Group for Clostridium difficile: history, role and perspectives (J.E. Coia and E.J. Kuijper).