Anti IF Antibody Test

[GGourmet]

This is more a point of interest.

Does anyone know how the test is done these days?

A contact of mine was involved in early testing at the Queen Victoria Hospital, East Grinstead.

There, live animal tissue was used to detect the presence of the antibodies and a fluorescent marker employed to show the reaction.

Apparently this was a highly reliable test.

I wonder what they use to test today, when I hear stories of it having a 50% false negative result.

Any thoughts?

[fbirder]

In the past a RadioImmunoassay (RIA) was used. Recently an Enzyme-Linked ImmunoSorbent Assay (ELISA) has been used.

This is the latest test: accessdata.fda.gov/cdrh_doc...

I have no idea why these tests suffer from so many false positives.

[Gambit62 Administrator in reply to fbirder]

false positive or false negative? in relation to IFA

could the false negative be because detection of antibodies at low level is problematic so difficult to distinguish between a sample that has none and a sample that has a few?

[GGourmet in reply to Gambit62]

Great question and perhaps this is the issue with the newer testing regime.

[fbirder in reply to Gambit62]

D'oh!

Yes, I meant to say false negatives.