Published online by Cambridge University Press: 02 January 2015
Between 1987 and 1989, two sequential outbreaks of nosocomial infection caused by Enterobacter cloacae occurred in the pediatric intensive-care unit of a tertiary-care teaching hospital. Seventeen strains retrieved from the outbreaks and two control strains identified in other wards were typed by ribotyping and random amplification of polymorphic DNA (RAPD). The results indicated that the genomic pattern of strains identified between the first and second outbreaks was different. We conclude that both ribotyping and RAPD are highly discriminatory and reproducible methods for typing E cloacae. RAPD seems to be more efficacious and cost-effective.