Immunoassays for the diagnosis of viral enteric pathogens

The accurate diagnosis of infectious diseases is important for the optimal management of infected patients as well as for the prevention of disease transmission to susceptible individuals. Because viral gastroenteritis constitutes an important cause of morbidity in children living in developed countries and of mortality in children living in developing countries, there has been a great deal of interest in the development of effective methods for the diagnosis and study of this disease. While there are a number of assay systems that are capable of accurate detection of the agents of viral gastroenteritis in the intestinal contents of infected individuals, solid phase enzyme immunoassays have been used widely for this purpose. The widespread utilization of enzyme immunoassays is based on the advantages inherent in the use of enzymatic markers. These advantages include the stability of enzyme-immunoglobulin conjugates, the high degree of sensitivity inherent in the magnifying nature of enzyme-substrate interactions, and the low cost of assays performed in simple reaction formats. Enzyme immunoassays have thus been developed and widely used for the detection and epidemiologic study of rotaviruses, adenoviruses, coxsackie viruses, hepatitis A virus, and other agents that replicate in the human gastrointestinal tract. In addition, latex agglutination assays and nucleic acid hybridization techniques have been applied to the rapid detection of enteric viruses. It is likely that the application of a number of assay systems will promote accurate identification of a wide range of viral pathogens under different clinical, epidemiologic, and laboratory situations.