Practical application of synthetic A and B blood group immunoadsorbents

The effectiveness of synthetic blood group A and B immunoadsorbents in removing anti-A and anti-B from human sera was evaluated. The sera contained specific alloantibodies and were destined for use as diagnostic reagents. Both Synsorb-A(TM) and Synsorb-B(TM) removed all saline anti-A or anti-B activity from 20 sera tested. All trace of anti-A activity detectable by the indirect antiglobulin test was removed from only 20% of sera; anti-B with similar reactivity was removed from 66% of sera. Specific (wanted) alloantibody titres were reduced by synsorb-A in 60% of sera, but were unaffected by Synsorb-B. Despite these shortcomings, such immunoadsorbents are of value particularly when cells of appropriate phenotype are unavailable for absorptions.