Objective: To apply the automatically microscopic scanning system in the etiological diagnosis of schistosomiasis, as an alternative to the traditional manual microscopy detection, and improve the detection rates and efficiency of examinations of fecal slides.
Methods: A single-blind method was used throughout the process of both the automatic microscopic scanning system and traditional manual microscopy reading. Each of five professionals read 20 Kato-Katz manure piece samples. The detection results and time for each sample were recorded. The two methods were compared by the film reading speed, sensitivity, specificity, and accuracy.
Results: The overall accuracy of the diagnosis of schistosomiasis of the automatically microscopic scanning image system was 99.00%, higher than that of the traditional manual microscopy detection (91.00%) (P < 0.05); the sensitivity and specificity of the image system were 98.57% and 100%, respectively, and also higher than those of the traditional manual microscopy method (90.00% and 93.33%) (all P < 0.05).
Conclusions: The automatically microscopic scanning system is powerful, the scanning speed is fast, and the operation is easy. Its speed, accuracy, sensitivity and specificity are superior to those of the conventional manual microscopy; therefore, it is suitable for the etiological diagnosis of schistosomiasis at the grassroots' level.