Author/Authors :
Honarmand, Hamid Reza Cellular and Molecular Research Center - Faculty of Medicine - Guilan University of Medical Sciences - Guilan , Abdollahpour, Gholamreza Leptospira Research Laboratory - Faculty of Veterinary Medicine , Eshraghi, Saeed Department of Pathobiology - Faculty of Health -Tehran University of Medical Sciences -Tehran
Abstract :
Background: Leptospirosis is the most common zoonosis
widespread in tropical and temperate countries with low social-
economic status. We aimed to compare an ELISA kit with
an in-house ELISA assay to test the serum samples of the patients
who were suspicious of leptospirosis according to their
clinical symptoms.
Methods: A total of 282 serum samples of patients suspicious
of leptospirosis admitted to hospitals in Rasht city (north of
Iran) were examined for sero-diagnosis of leptospirosis. Blood
samples were obtained with mean time of 6.36 days after the
onset of the symptoms. Antibodies were detected using a commercial
qualitative and by an in-house semi quantitative IgM
and IgG ELISA and the results were compared with microscopic
agglutination test (MAT) as the gold standard. All
specimens with titers ≥320 against a pathogenic serovar in
MAT were considered positive for leptospirosis.
Results: The results of MAT have demonstrated that 70 serum
samples (24.8%) had a positive reaction with one of the leptospira
serovar. The sensitivity, specificity, positive and negative
predictive values were 87.1% , 91.0 %, 67.8%, and 95.5% for inhouse
ELISA assay, respectively, and 100%, 42.9%, 36.6%, and
100 % for commercial IgM ELISA assay, respectively.
Conclusion: Our results showed that IgM ELISA assay is a
reliable and sensitive method for the laboratory diagnosis of
acute leptospirosis. In-house semi quantitative IgM ELISA
was more specific and commercial IgM ELISA was more
sensitive.
