Evaluation of gel diffusion precipitation test in invasive amoebiasis

Abstract

Agar-gel diffusion (Ouchterlony's technique) test was carried out with sera from 85 persons consisting of different forms of amoebiasis and controls. Precipitin bands were observed in 60% cases of amoebic dysentery and 74.3% cases of amoebic liver abscess. The results of the gel diffusion test were compared with that of the indirect haemagglutination test (IHA). The former became positive whenever IHA titre was 1 : 486 or above. The number of precipitin bands increased with the increase of IHA titre. Although gel diffusion was found to be less sensitive than IHA, its use is recommended as a routine method of sero-diagnosis of invasive amoebiasis, where the sophisticated laboratory techniques are not available.