BLOCKING ANTIBODY-ASSAY FOR CONFIRMATION OF UROGENITAL CHLAMYDIA INFECTION

We evaluated the Syva MicroTrak Chlamydia Blocking Antibody Assay as a confirmatory assay for the detection of Chlamydia trachomatis in urog enital specimens. During a 5-month period, 109 positives were obtained (4.9%) by the MicroTrak II Enzyme Immunoassay as implemented with the Syva XL automated enzyme immunoassay instrument. Of 98 evaluable samp les, 92 (93.9%) were confirmed as positive by the blocking assay, and 3 blocking-negative samples had organisms detected by direct fluoresce nt-antibody analysis (blocking sensitivity, 96.8%). We found that dire ct fluorescent-antibody analysis of samples with a specimen-to-cutoff absorbance ratio of less than or equal to 2.0 was a reasonable confirm ation alternative and was more cost-effective than the blocking assay.