HLA class II genotyping: two assay systems compared

In the last few years, a variety of DNA-based human leukocyte antigen (HLA) typing methods have emerged, revealing the extreme polymorphism of HLA genes. This polymorphism makes it difficult for a clinical laboratory to establish the best HLA typing strategy. In this study we have compared two techniques for performing HLA-DRB typing: a commercial rapid assay based on the polymerase chain reaction (PCR) followed by reverse dot-blot hybridization of the PCR products (the Inno-LiPA assay), and a method based on PCR followed by restriction fragment length polymorphism analysis. We found that both methods provide reliable results with a high rate of concordance (97%) and that Inno-LiPA is convenient for large-scale routine typing. However, if a high-resolution allelic typing is required, each method lacks accuracy but using them in association improves the accuracy of the results.