title: A robust dry reagent lateral flow assay for diagnosis of active schistosomiasis by detection of Schistosoma circulating anodic antigen.
abstract: An earlier reported laboratory assay, performed in The Netherlands, to diagnose Schistosoma infections by detection of the parasite antigen CAA in serum was converted to a more user-friendly format with dry reagents. The improved assay requires less equipment and allows storage and worldwide shipping at ambient temperature. Evaluation of the new assay format was carried out by local staff at Ampath Laboratories, South Africa. The lateral flow (LF) based assay utilized fluorescent ultrasensitive up-converting phosphor (UCP) reporter particles, to be read by a portable reader (UPlink) that was also provided to the laboratory. Over a period of 18 months, about 2000 clinical samples were analyzed prospectively in parallel with a routinely carried out CAA-ELISA. LF test results and ELISA data correlated very well at CAA concentrations above 300 pg/mL serum. At lower concentrations the UCP-LF test indicates a better performance than the ELISA. The UCP-LF strips can be stored as a permanent record as the UCP label does not fade. At the end of the 18 months testing period, LF strips were shipped back to The Netherlands where scan results obtained in South Africa were validated with different UCP scanning equipment including a novel, custom developed, small lightweight UCP strip reader (UCP-Quant), well suited for testing in low resource settings.
  
  
  CONCLUSIONS
  The dry format UCP-LF assay was shown to provide a robust and easy to use format for rapid testing of CAA antigen in serum. It performed at least as good as the ELISA with respect to sensitivity and specificity, and was found to be superior with respect to speed and simplicity of use. Worldwide shipping at ambient temperature of the assay reagents, and the availability of small scanners to analyze the CAA UCP-LF strip, are two major steps towards point-of-care (POC) applications in remote and resource poor environments to accurately identify low (30 pg CAA/mL serum; equivalent to about 10 worm pairs) to heavy Schistosoma infections.
authors.affiliation: Department of Parasitology, Leiden University Medical Center, P.O. Box 9600, 2300 RC Leiden, The Netherlands.
authors.forename: Govert J
authors.initials: GJ
authors.lastname: van Dam
authors.forename: Claudia J
authors.initials: CJ
authors.lastname: de Dood
authors.forename: Melanie
authors.initials: M
authors.lastname: Lewis
authors.forename: André M
authors.initials: AM
authors.lastname: Deelder
authors.forename: Lisette
authors.initials: L
authors.lastname: van Lieshout
authors.forename: Hans J
authors.initials: HJ
authors.lastname: Tanke
authors.forename: Louis H
authors.initials: LH
authors.lastname: van Rooyen
authors.forename: Paul L A M
authors.initials: PL
authors.lastname: Corstjens
mesh_terms: D000818:Animals; D000947:Antigens, Helminth / Q000032:analysis*; D004797:Enzyme-Linked Immunosorbent Assay / Q000592:standards; D005434:Flow Cytometry / Q000379:methods* / Q000592:standards; D006023:Glycoproteins / Q000032:analysis*; D015801:Helminth Proteins / Q000032:analysis*; D006801:Humans; D011786:Quality Control; D012547:Schistosoma / Q000276:immunology*; D012552:Schistosomiasis / Q000175:diagnosis*; D012680:Sensitivity and Specificity
chemical_list: D000947:Antigens, Helminth; D006023:Glycoproteins; D015801:Helminth Proteins; C090907:circulating anodic antigen, Schistosoma mansoni
keywords: AWA; CAA; CCA; Circulating antigen; Dry reagent; FC; HSLF; LF; Lateral flow strip test; MαCAA; POC; QC; SD; Schistosomiasis; T; TCA; UCP; Up-converting phosphor; User-friendly; Worldwide shipping; adult worm antigen; circulating anodic antigen; circulating cathodic antigen; flow control; high salt lateral flow; lateral flow; mouse anti-CAA; point-of-care; quality control; standard deviation; test; trichloroacetic acid; up-converting phosphor