Panton-Valentine leukocidin (PVL) appears to be a virulence factor which, among others, can exacerbate the pathogenicity of Staphylococcus aureus infections, especially inducing severe necrotic, deep-seated skin infections, abscesses, and recurrences. These peculiarities have some overlaps with hidradenitis suppurativa (HS). Our main aim was to assess if S. aureus producing PVL could have some role in influencing clinical features and/or course of HS, specifically in the suppuration and recurrence of lesions. This pilot, mono-centric, observational study included all adult subjects affected with HS consecutively referring to our HS clinic over a 3-month period. Clinically evident suppuration and at least 2 weeks wash out from any antibiotic were the main inclusion criteria. Purulent material from HS skin lesions was collected with swabs in order to isolate micro-organisms, with specific regard to S. aureus. Detection of PVL was performed by real-time quantitative PCR (RT-qPCR). We also analyzed purulent material from suppurative skin lesions other than HS, as a control. Thirty HS patients were included; 29 purulent lesions (96.7%) harbored at least one bacterial species. Five (16.7%) swab samples were positive for S. aureus, none of which was positive for PVL genes. Among the 30 purulent disorders included as controls, 8 (26.3%) were positive for S. aureus; of these, 4 strains (50%) expressed LPV. The study results seem to exclude the pathogenetic involvement of S. aureus producing PVL in HS; as a result, PVL does not seem to represent a potential target in the future development of HS treatments.

Panton-Valentine leukocidin（PVL）似乎是一种毒力因子，除其他因素外，它可以加剧金黄色葡萄球菌感染的致病性，特别是引起严重的坏死性深层皮肤感染，脓肿和复发。这些特点与化脓性汗腺炎（HS）有一些重叠。我们的主要目的是评估金黄色葡萄球菌是否产生PVL可能在影响HS的临床特征和/或病程中有一定作用，特别是在病变的化脓和复发中。这项先导性，单中心，观察性研究涵盖了在3个月内连续访问我们HS诊所的所有受HS影响的成人受试者。主要的入选标准是临床上明显的化脓和任何抗生素至少冲洗2周。用拭子收集来自HS皮肤病变的化脓物质，以分离微生物，特别是针对金黄色葡萄球菌。PVL的检测通过实时定量PCR（RT-qPCR）进行。我们还分析了除化脓性皮肤病变（除HS以外）的化脓性物质作为对照。包括30例HS患者; 29个化脓性病变（占96.7％）包含至少一种细菌。5个（16.7％）拭子样本对金黄色葡萄球菌呈阳性，但对PVL基因均无阳性。在作为对照的30例化脓性疾病中，有8例（26.3％）对金黄色葡萄球菌呈阳性。其中有4个菌株（50％）表达了LPV。该研究结果似乎排除了在HS中产生金黄色葡萄球菌PVL的致病因素。结果，PVL似乎不代表HS治疗的未来发展中的潜在目标。