Sg. Whitfield et al., A comparative study of the fluorescent antibody test for rabies diagnosis in fresh and formalin-fixed brain tissue specimens, J VIROL MET, 95(1-2), 2001, pp. 145-151
Many diagnostic methods have been used to detect rabies virus antigen. The
preferred method for routine diagnosis of rabies in fresh or frozen brain t
issues is the fluorescent antibody test (FAT). In this study, the FAT was u
sed to evaluate the rabies status of fresh/frozen brain specimens from more
than 800 rabies-suspected cases, in more than 14 different species of anim
als. A comparable brain specimen from each case was fixed in 10%, buffered
formalin and examined by the FAT. The evaluation of rabies status between f
resh and formalin-fixed tissues was in agreement in more than 99.8% of the
cases. When fresh tissue is not available for testing, these results valida
te the use of this procedure for routine diagnosis of rabies in formalin-fi
xed brain tissues. (C) 2001 Elsevier Science B.V. All rights reserved.