DETECTION OF ANTIRABIES ANTIBODY IN DOGS BY IHA; COMPARISION WITH RABIES ELISA TEST
Objective: Precise and fast diagnosis of rabies is very important for prevention and treatment of this disease in humans and animals. An indirect hemagglutination (IHA) test, for determination of anti-rabies antibody in dogs was used and compared with the commercially available rabies ELISA.
Materials and Methods: In this study 35 serum sample from vaccinated dogs were tested by both ELISA (Platelia Rabies Kit, France) and IHA tests.
Results: Out of 35 vaccinated dogs, 32 cases (91.42%) had antibody titer between 0.5 - 2.5 IU/ml and the rest were lower than 0.5 IU/ml.
Conclusion: All of the nonvaccinated dogs were antibody negative by both procedures, with the exception of two cases (13.33%) that showed antibody titers of 0.15 IU/ml with ELISA but were negative by the IHA test. The IHA procedure gave results that were comparable with those obtained by ELISA. The data showed 92% coincidence between the two tests. Therefore, the sensitivity and specificity of IHA for detection of rabies antibody was as good as that of ELISA, and it can be used as a screening test for the analysis of samples.