Serological diagnosis of influenza A/USSR/77 H1N1 infection: Value of ELISA compared to other antibody techniques

Abstract

Serologic diagnosis of influenza is an important but imperfect tool. During an outbreak of natural HlNl A/USSR/77 infection, volunteers who received either amantadine, rimantadine, or placebo were tested to determine serologic response to infection by four different antibody techniques. Hemagglutination inhibition (HAI) and complement fixation (CF) were least sensitive, detecting only about half of the virus-positive subjects, whereas neutralization detected 81 % and enzyme-linked immune peroxidase (ELISA) detected 95 %. Failure to detect significant antibody response was associated with a higher titer of antibody in acute serum specimens and with a history of receipt of A/New Jersey/76 HswlNl vaccine. Although antibody response measured by ELISA was of lower magnitude in vaccinees, it still was sufficient to be diagnostic. Thus, in situations where there is no access to viral isolation facilities, ELISA antibody techniques appear to be an excellent measure of assessing the rate of influenza infection.

Use of Recombinant Nucleoproteins in Enzyme-Linked Immunosorbent Assays for Detection of Virus-Specific Immunoglobulin A (IgA) and IgG Antibodies in Influenza Virus A- or B-Infected Patients

“…The results of the IgG NP ELISAs for the detection of influenza virus A-specific antibodies compared well with the results obtained by the HI assay. The IgG NP ELISA for the measurement of influenza virus B-specific antibodies, however, de-tected a higher percentage of patients with increased antibody titers than the HI assay, which is in agreement with the results of earlier studies (2,11,14,16,17,22,23).…”

Diagnosis of influenza A virus infections by detection of specific immunoglobulins M, A, and G in serum

“…Virol., abstr. P 33-13, p. 30,1984) but has not yet come into common use. In the present prospective study on mostly elderly patients we confirmed that detection of specific IgM by HIT may be of value for early diagnosis of a Evaluated in 36 patients with influenza A viral antigens detected in NPS as the reference.…”

“…The complement fixation (CF) test and hemagglutination inhibition test are the most commonly used serological methods for the diagnosis of influenza A. Introduction of immunosorbent assays has improved the serological diagnosis of influenza A (14,16,19,30) and provided the possibility of detecting antibodies of different immunoglobulin classes (5,17,21). The immunoglobulin M (IgM) antibody response in naturally infected patients has been documented with a variety of serological methods (2)(3)(4)(5)11).…”

Immunization of elderly volunteers with the 1988?89 inactivated whole influenza vaccine: Assessment of antibody responses by haemagglutination inhibition and single radial haemolysis tests

“…The necessity of annual immunization against influenza viruses is motivated by the high degree of antigenic variability of the influenza virus surface proteins (43) and by the short-term immune protection induced by natural infection or vaccination (3,5,24,30). Nevertheless, the need for periodic vaccination is not unanimously accepted among clinicians (10, 31, 46), especially because of the difficulties and the divergent results of many published studies concerning the effects of these yearly injections (2,11,17,21).…”

“…Moreover, as the sensitivity of serological tests for detecting antibodies against influenza antigens may be different (19,26,32,34,43), a limited, but representative number of sera (91 volunteers), was examined for the presence of antibodies against the viral haemagglutinin with single radial haemolysis technique (SRH) and the results were compared with those obtained in the same subjects with HI test.…”