Evaluation of HLA in detection of non-parentage among known false trios

This paternity study was performed with trios in which the putative father was not the biological father (NBF), in order to evaluate the effectiveness of HLA-A and -B phenotyping for routine testing. All 372 generated trios had ABO, Rh, MNS, Kell, Duffy, Kidd and HLA (A and B) systems tested. HLA-A and -B phenotyping directly excluded 81.73% of NBF. Red blood cell markers excluded 8.82% of NBF missed by HLA; only 0.81% of NBF were not identified by the markers used. Each laboratory engaged in disputed paternity testing should evaluate its actual performance in detecting non-biological fathers and its exclusion rates in real trios. These data together can be used as a guide of mother's reliability.