title: Evaluation of anti-HTLV-1 in physical-checkup individuals and blood donors in Taiwan.
abstract: The gelatin particle agglutination (GPA) test specific for antibody detection of human T-cell lymphotropic virus type 1 (HTLV-1) was used to screen 500 blood donors and 5000 physical-checkup individuals at Veterans General Hospital-Taipei. The positive rate of physical-checkup individuals and the blood donors was 0.18% (9/5000) and 0% (0/5000) respectively. Among the 9 GPA positive specimens, eight were confirmed to be positive by western blot analysis and a prevalence rate of 0.16% (8/5000). Seven of the nine GPA positive samples were also positive by indirect fluorescent antibody test and two of them had indeterminate results. Since GPA is less expensive, relatively simple and convenient, we recommend that GPA could be used as screening test for HTLV-1 infection of blood donors, followed by western blot method as a confirmatory test in blood bank.
authors.affiliation: Blood bank, Department of Medicine, Veterans General Hospital, National Yang-Ming Medical College, Taipei, Taiwan, Republic of China.
authors.forename: C H
authors.initials: CH
authors.lastname: Yung
authors.forename: M P
authors.initials: MP
authors.lastname: Chow
authors.forename: H Y
authors.initials: HY
authors.lastname: Hu
authors.forename: J L
authors.initials: JL
authors.lastname: Tzeng
authors.forename: Y S
authors.initials: YS
authors.lastname: Wu
authors.forename: J Y
authors.initials: JY
authors.lastname: Lyou
authors.forename: W T
authors.initials: WT
authors.lastname: Liu
mesh_terms: D000293:Adolescent; D000328:Adult; D000368:Aged; D000372:Agglutination Tests; D001782:Blood Donors; D015153:Blotting, Western; D002353:Carrier State / Q000453:epidemiology / Q000276:immunology; D005260:Female; D005455:Fluorescent Antibody Technique; D015481:HTLV-I Antibodies / Q000032:analysis*; D015490:HTLV-I Infections / Q000453:epidemiology / Q000276:immunology; D006801:Humans; D008297:Male; D008875:Middle Aged; D010808:Physical Examination; D012189:Retrospective Studies; D013624:Taiwan / Q000453:epidemiology
chemical_list: D015481:HTLV-I Antibodies