Application of thin layer immunoassay (TIA) for demonstration of antibodies against Entamoeba histolytica.

Thin layer immunoassay (TIA) was used to demonstrate antibodies against Entamoeba histolytica in sera from patients and blood donors. The TIA results agreed well with those obtained by the indirect hemagglutination (IHA) and immunodiffusion (ID) techniques. It is suggested that because of its technical simplicity and low cost TIA may be used alternatively or in addition to the IHA and ID techniques for screening patient sera for antibodies to E. histolytica. However, the new technique must first be evaluated on a goup of clinically well defined patients with different stages of amebiasis.