PERFORMANCE OF EUROPEAN LABORATORIES TESTING SERUM SAMPLES FOR TOXOPLASMA-GONDII

One hundred twenty-nine European laboratories participated in a collab orative, multicentre study designed to evaluate the overall reliabilit y of different serological techniques for diagnosis of Toxoplasma gond ii infection, Five freeze-dried reference sera were distributed to eac h laboratory, each of which analysed the sera with its routine methods , The enzyme-linked immunosorbent assay was the technique used most fr equently, followed by the immunofluorescent antibody technique, Only n ine laboratories performed the Sabin-Feldman dye test, In general, the re was good concordance between qualitative results, but for sera with low concentrations of Toxoplasma gondii-specific IgG antibodies, some false-negative results were found, For specific IgM and IgA antibodie s, the immunosorbent agglutination assay proved the most sensitive, Th e present study demonstrates the need for regular assessment of labora tory serodiagnosis of Toxoplasma gondii infection.