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Journal of Clinical Microbiology, September 1998, p. 2423-2427, Vol. 36, No. 9
Institute of Microbiology,
Received 23 February 1998/Returned for modification 6 April
1998/Accepted 2 June 1998
Chagas' disease is a common cause of morbidity in Latin American
countries. In Brazil, naturally occurring transmission of its etiologic
agent, Trypanosoma cruzi, has been almost completely abolished through effective control programs aimed at the triatomid insect vector. Thus, transfusion of blood from infected donors has
become the major route for contracting Chagas' disease due to the
socioeconomically motivated migration of residents from areas where the
disease is endemic to the larger urban centers. Therefore, the
employment of screening tests is mandatory for all blood banks
throughout the country. We compared the diagnostic performances of
three commercially available screening assays used in routine testing
in Brazilian blood banks: the Abbott Chagas antibody enzyme immunoassay
(Abbott Laboratórios do Brasil, São Paulo), the
BIOELISACRUZI kit (Biolab-Mérieux, Rio de Janeiro, Brazil), and
the BIOZIMA Chagas kit (Polychaco S.A.I.C., Buenos Aires, Argentina).
The evaluation was performed with sera obtained from chagasic patients
and healthy residents of four different areas in Brazil where Chagas'
disease is either endemic or emergent and where clinical manifestations
of the disease and circulating parasite strains vary. The results
obtained with each kit were compared to matched in-house enzyme-linked
immunosorbent assay and immunofluorescence assay data obtained for each
sample. Depending on the area under investigation, the three commercial
kits produced specificity values between 93.3 and 100.0%, sensitivity
values between 97.7 and 100%, and accuracies ranging from 93.6 to
100.0%.
0095-1137/98/$04.00+0
Copyright © 1998, American Society for Microbiology. All rights reserved.
Evaluation of Three Commercial Enzyme-Linked Immunosorbent Assays
for Diagnosis of Chagas' Disease
*
Corresponding author. Mailing address: Departamento de
Imunologia, Instituto de Microbiologia, UFRJ-CCS, Ilha do Fundão, 21941-590 Rio de Janeiro, Brazil. Phone: 0055-21-270 0990. Fax: 0055-21-560 8028. E-mail: IMIMWAL{at}MICROBIO.UFRJ.BR.
Journal of Clinical Microbiology, September 1998, p. 2423-2427, Vol. 36, No. 9
0095-1137/98/$04.00+0
Copyright © 1998, American Society for Microbiology. All rights reserved.
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