title: Pilot testing of dipsticks as point-of-care assays for rapid diagnosis of poor-quality artemisinin drugs in endemic settings.
abstract: BACKGROUND
  Good-quality artemisinin drugs are essential for malaria treatment, but increasing prevalence of poor-quality artemisinin drugs in many endemic countries hinders effective management of malaria cases.
  
  
  METHODS
  To develop a point-of-care assay for rapid identification of counterfeit and substandard artemisinin drugs for resource-limited areas, we used specific monoclonal antibodies against artesunate and artemether, and developed prototypes of lateral flow dipstick assays. In this pilot test, we evaluated the feasibility of these dipsticks under different endemic settings and their performance in the hands of untrained personnel.
  
  
  RESULTS
  The results showed that the dipstick tests can be successfully performed by different investigators with the included instruction sheet. None of the artemether and artesunate drugs collected from public pharmacies in different endemic countries failed the test.
  
  
  CONCLUSIONS
  It is possible that the simple dipstick assays, with future optimization of test conditions and sensitivity, can be used as a qualitative and semi-quantitative assay for rapid screening of counterfeit artemisinin drugs in endemic settings.
authors.affiliation: College of Agronomy and Biotechnology, China Agricultural University, Beijing, China.
authors.forename: Suqin
authors.initials: S
authors.lastname: Guo
authors.affiliation: College of Agronomy and Biotechnology, China Agricultural University, Beijing, China.|Present address: College of Agronomy, Guangxi University, 530004 Nanning, China.
authors.forename: Lishan
authors.initials: L
authors.lastname: He
authors.affiliation: Department of Epidemiology and Biostatistics, Case Western Reserve University, Cleveland, OH USA.
authors.forename: Daniel J
authors.initials: DJ
authors.lastname: Tisch
authors.affiliation: Center for Global Health and Diseases, Case Western Reserve University, Cleveland, OH USA.
authors.forename: James
authors.initials: J
authors.lastname: Kazura
authors.affiliation: Malaria Research Department, Macha Research Trust, Johns Hopkins Malaria Research Institute, Choma, Zambia.
authors.forename: Sungano
authors.initials: S
authors.lastname: Mharakurwa
authors.affiliation: Regional Medical Research Centre (NE), Dibrugarh, 786001 Assam India.
authors.forename: Jagadish
authors.initials: J
authors.lastname: Mahanta
authors.affiliation: Caucaseco Scientific Research Center and Malaria Vaccine and Drug Development Center, Cali, Colombia.
authors.forename: Sócrates
authors.initials: S
authors.lastname: Herrera
authors.affiliation: College of Agronomy and Biotechnology, China Agricultural University, Beijing, China.
authors.forename: Baomin
authors.initials: B
authors.lastname: Wang
authors.affiliation: Department of Entomology, Pennsylvania State University, University Park, PA 16802 USA.
authors.forename: Liwang
authors.initials: L
authors.lastname: Cui
keywords: Antibody; Artemisinin-based combination therapies (ACTs); Dipstick; Malaria