Background: Laboratory diagnosis of syphilis is usually accomplished by serology. There are currently a large number of different commercial treponemal tests available that vary in format, sensitivity and specificity.
Aim: To evaluate the ID-PaGIA Syphilis Antibody Test as an alternative to other specific treponemal tests for primary screening or confirmation of diagnosis.
Methods: Serum samples from healthy adults (n = 100) were used for detection of specificity of ID-PaGIA. To evaluate sensitivity of ID-PaGIA serum samples (n = 101) from patients with confirmed or suspected syphilis were tested for syphilis antibodies with FTA-Abs IgM, ID-PaGIA, ELISA IgM and TPHA tests.
Results: No false-positive results were found with ID-PaGIA. Sensitivity of various treponemal tests was the following: FTA-Abs IgM: 95.5%, ID-PaGIA and ELISA IgM: 94%, and TPHA 75%. The positive and negative predictive values of ID-PaGIA were 100 and 89.5%, respectively.
Conclusions: Compared with other treponemal tests ID-PaGIA has excellent sensitivity and specificity.