Short report: Evaluation of a monoclonal antibody-based latex agglutination test for rapid diagnosis of septicemic melioidosis

A monoclonal antibody (MAb)-based latex agglutination (MAb-LA) test was dev eloped to rapidly identify Burkholderia pseudomallei in hemoculture of pati ents with septicemic melioidosis. The method was evaluated in a clinical si tuation on 396 hemocultures positive for bacterial growth, of which 75 cult ures were positive for B. pseudomallei by conventional biochemical tests. T he sensitivity and specificity of the MAb-LA test were 95% and 100%, respec tively. The positive and negative predictive values were 100% and 99%. The method is highly reliable and suitable for rapid diagnosis of septicemic me lioidosis, reducing the time normally required from a minimum of 3-4 days b y conventional methods to less than 30 hr. Most of these 30 hr are involved in growing up enough bacteria to perform the MAb-LA test, which itself tak es only 1 min.