Pneumococcal capsular antigens were detected and serotyped by coagglutination in joint fluids and serum of a patient with septic arthritis within 1 h of obtaining the specimens. Pneumococcal antigens continued to be detected by coagglutination for 3 days, whereas cultures and Gram stains were negative after 1 day of antibiotic therapy.

PURPOSE Microarray studies indicate medulloblastoma comprises distinct molecular disease subgroups, which offer potential for improved clinical management. EXPERIMENTAL DESIGN Minimal mRNA expression signatures diagnostic for the Wnt/Wingless (WNT) and Sonic Hedgehog (SHH) subgroups were developed, validated, and used to assign subgroup affiliation in 173 tumors from four independent cohorts,...

The rapid and accurate diagnosis of childhood malignancy is important both in the planning of appropriate treatment and in relieving the inevitable family anxiety. The use of flow cytometry to analyse monoclonal antibody coated single cell suspensions is widely accepted as having increased the speed and accuracy of diagnosis in leukaemias, though its use in solid tumour diagnosis is not widely ...

Seventy-eight unselected children under the age of 2 years suffering from acute respiratory infections were investigated by the fluorescent antibody technique and a comparison was made with conventional isolation and serological methods. Sixty-nine per cent. of children with bronchiolitis were diagnosed as suffering from respiratory syncytial virus infection on the day of admission by examinati...

Managing children with influenza-like illness is associated with costly and painful interventions because, in order to distinguish viral from bacterial infections, diagnostic tests (including routine blood examinations and chest radiographs) are frequently performed, 2 and the empirical use of antimicrobial agents is common. Various rapid diagnostic techniques for the detection of influenza vir...

An immunofluorescent (IF) method that detects Burkholderia pseudomallei in clinical specimens within 10 min was devised. The results of this rapid method and those of an existing IF method were prospectively compared with the culture results for 776 specimens from patients with suspected melioidosis. The sensitivities of both IF tests were 66%, and the specificities were 99.5 and 99.4%, respect...

BACKGROUND The Surecell herpes (HSV) test kit is a test for detecting the presence of herpes simplex viral antigen by means of a monoclonal antibody based immunoassay. The test has proved to be highly sensitive and specific in diagnosing genital, oral, and dermatological herpes infections. METHODS In this study, samples from patients with ocular keratitis were evaluated by tissue cultures and...

Group A beta-haemolytic streptococci were isolated from 51 (9.8%) of 519 patients with pharyngitis. Throat culture results showed the mean sensitivity, specificity and predictive value of a positive Gram-stained smear of pharyngeal secretions as 70%, 89% and 69%. The data suggest that Gram staining of a smear directly from the swab is as accurate as and more speedy than a culture from the phary...

To improve the specificity of biochemical markers of myocardial infarction (MI) a method to measure cardiac troponin-I (CTn-I) was developed. CTn-I is a protein unique to cardiac muscle and is released after MI. Consecutive 150 patients admitted to the coronary care unit was studied. Value of CTn-I was determined in all samples. CTn-I concentration in the MI patients group was increased compare...