Abstract
Human cryptosporidiosis remains underdiagnosed, and rapid/accurate diagnosis is of clinical importance. Diagnosis of the Cryptosporidium oocyst in stool samples by conventional microscopy is labor-intensive, time-consuming, and requires skillful experience. Thus, we aimed to evaluate the usefulness of a coproantigen enzyme-linked immunosorbent assay (ELISA) test in detecting Cryptosporidium spp. from fecal specimens. For this aim, we evaluated the performances of a commercial ELISA (CoproELISA Cryptosporidium kit, Savyon Diagnostics, Israel) for the detection of Cryptosporidium spp. in random clinical stool samples through a multicenter study. The sensitivity and specificity for coproantigen ELISA were 98.86% and 94.32%, respectively. The coproantigen ELISA results indicate that the simple, rapid, reliable, and standardized immunoassay test is sensitive and specific for routine diagnosis, and may be useful for large-scale epidemiological studies of cryptosporidiosis.
Highlights
Cryptosporidiosis, an emerging infectious disease of public health significance worldwide, is caused by the protozoan Cryptosporidium
Most available clinical samples being preserved in K2CRO4 and/or frozen buffers, preliminary experiments were aimed at evaluating the effects of K2CRO4 treatment and freezing on enzyme-linked immunosorbent assay (ELISA) antigen detection
For 28 C. parvum PCR-positive random samples examined by Lab#3, optical density (OD) ranged from 0.800 to 4.060
Summary
Cryptosporidiosis, an emerging infectious disease of public health significance worldwide, is caused by the protozoan Cryptosporidium. Twenty-three species and valid genotypes of Cryptosporidium spp. have been described from a wide range of vertebrates, including humans, mammals, wildlife, domestic livestock, reptile, birds, amphibians, and fish, causing asymptomatic or mild-to-severe gastrointestinal disease in its host species [1]. Cryptosporidium can cause chronic diarrhea, abdominal pain, weakness, weight loss, Microorganisms 2021, 9, 209. The diagnosis of cryptosporidiosis is usually made by microscopic detection of the parasite oocysts. This method is labor-intensive, time-consuming, requires skillful experience, and has low sensitivity [4,5]. Molecular biology techniques have become diagnostic tools that have been used to understand the epidemiology of Cryptosporidium spp. The expense and requirement for technical expertise have limited their use, in high-prevalence regions, such as developing countries
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