The value of a latex agglutination test (Escherichia coli O157 latex test; Oxoid Ltd.) for rapid presumptive detection of E. coli serotype O157:H7 was determined by laboratory trials and during an outbreak of hemorrhagic colitis. The latex test was found to be a simple, highly efficient and reliable test in detecting E. coli O157:H7 with 100% sensitivity and specificity. It was also found that ...

An unusual strain of methicillin-resistant Staphylococcus aureus (MRSA) was repeatedly isolated from infants in a newborn special care unit (NBSC) and a newborn intensive care unit. Between January 1989 and March 1990, approximately 100 isolates from infected or colonized infants were recovered. Surveillance cultures taken during this time revealed a 20% colonization rate, which was defined as ...

OBJECTIVE Rapid detection of serum anti-ganglioside antibodies in Guillain-Barré syndrome (GBS) could facilitate early diagnosis and early initiation of treatment, which might shorten the term of illness and reduce sequelae. We examined serum anti-ganglioside antibodies in patients with GBS using the latex agglutination assay developed by Alaedini and Latov (J Immunoassay 21: 377-386, 2000) wit...

C-reactive protein (CRP) is an acute phase reactant the concentration of which increases significantly following tissue injury or inflammation. It is present in the albumin fraction of the serum of patients and is antigenic upon injection into rabbits. We report here the development of a local latex reagent coated with rabbit anti-CRP. For this purpose CRP was isolated from pooled sera of patie...

BACKGROUND & OBJECTIVE Conventional methods to detect methicillin resistance in Staphylococcus aureus are inadequate as expression of resistance is subject to environmental and conditional expression of PBP2a antigen. The objective of the present study was to determine methicillin resistance in S. aureus by conventional susceptibility (oxacillin disc diffusion and oxacillin MIC) and molecular m...

The performance of the Virogen Rotatest latex agglutination test (LAT) was evaluated for detection of bovine rotavirus antigen. Sixty-three fecal samples from diarrheic calves were collected from November 1999 to May 2000 and screened by LAT, the Rotazyme II enzyme-linked immunosorbent assay (ELISA), and virus isolation (VI) followed by an anti-rotavirus fluorescent-antibody (FA) test to detect...