Abstract
At least 12 persons contracted clinical, and 4 persons subclinical Brucella melitensis infection during a brucellosis epidemic in the spring and summer of 1983 in Southern Germany, a region which had been free of this disease for the past 20 years. All cases of illness were traced to one infected herd of sheep. The presence of antibodies against B. melitensis was examined in 72 sera of infected patients using the following tests: agglutination, Coomb's test, two complement fixation tests with different antigen preparations (CFT 1 and 2), IgG and IgM enzyme-linked immunosorbent assay (ELISA), and opsonophagocytosis; and the occurrence of cross-reacting antibodies against Yersinia enterocolitica O 9 was investigated in the agglutination and complement fixation tests. Sera from 100 blood donors and 112 other people with close contact with sheep were also examined. The results revealed the need to consider an intermediate range in the interpretation of ELISA results--due to elevated values of persons in groups at risk but without clinical signs of illness. In all other tests, however, such persons revealed the same cut-off levels as the general population. Results from all initial sera of infected persons revealed titres of optical densities above the baseline levels determined in the present study, with the exception of the Coomb's and CFT2 tests. The agglutination test, but not brucella CFT2, revealed complete cross-reactivity between Y. enterocolitica O 9 and B. melitensis. ELISA stood out as the only test which is suited to diagnosis of both recent and past infection, since ELISA IgM determination permits conclusions about the time of the onset of illness, and determination of IgG may still yield values above the cut-off level up to 623 days after the onset of illness. In 2 of the 16 infected persons, IgG ELISA was the only test revealing previous infection 424 and 528 days after the onset of illness. A procedural scheme is presented which may help to simplify the diagnosis of brucellosis.
Full text
PDF
Selected References
These references are in PubMed. This may not be the complete list of references from this article.
- Ahvonen P., Jansson E., Aho K. Marked cross-agglutination between Brucellae and a subtype of Yersinia enterocolitica. Acta Pathol Microbiol Scand. 1969;75(2):291–295. [PubMed] [Google Scholar]
- Corbell M. J. The serological relationship between Brucella spp., Yersinia enterocolitica serotype IX and Salmonella serotypes of Kauffmann-White group N. J Hyg (Lond) 1975 Aug;75(1):151–171. doi: 10.1017/s0022172400047173. [DOI] [PMC free article] [PubMed] [Google Scholar]
- Granfors K., Viljanen M. K., Toivanen A. Measurement of immunoglobulin M, immunoglobulin G, and immunoglobulin A antibodies against Yersinia enterocolitica by enzyme-linked immunosorbent assay: comparison of lipopolysaccharide and whole bacterium as antigen. J Clin Microbiol. 1981 Jul;14(1):6–14. doi: 10.1128/jcm.14.1.6-14.1981. [DOI] [PMC free article] [PubMed] [Google Scholar]
- Heizmann W., Botzenhart K., Heber A. Lumbale Spondylitis bei Brucellose. Dtsch Med Wochenschr. 1984 Mar 16;109(11):436–437. [PubMed] [Google Scholar]
- Lindberg A. A., Haeggman S., Karlson K., Carlsson H. E., Mair N. S. Enzyme immunoassay of the antibody response to Brucella and Yersinia enterocolitica 09 infections in humans. J Hyg (Lond) 1982 Apr;88(2):295–307. doi: 10.1017/s0022172400070157. [DOI] [PMC free article] [PubMed] [Google Scholar]
- Magee J. T. An enzyme-labelled immunosorbent assay for Brucella abortus antibodies. J Med Microbiol. 1980 Feb;13(1):167–172. doi: 10.1099/00222615-13-1-167. [DOI] [PubMed] [Google Scholar]
- Parratt D., Nielsen K. H., White R. G. Radioimmunoassay of IgM, IgG, and IgA Brucella antibodies. Lancet. 1977 May 21;1(8021):1075–1078. doi: 10.1016/s0140-6736(77)92334-0. [DOI] [PubMed] [Google Scholar]
- Sippel J. E., El-Masry N. A., Farid Z. Diagnosis of human brucellosis with ELISA. Lancet. 1982 Jul 3;2(8288):19–21. doi: 10.1016/s0140-6736(82)91154-0. [DOI] [PubMed] [Google Scholar]