Proposed panel of diagnostic tools for accurate temporal classification of symptomatic T. gondii infection

Abstract

Serological tests available for the diagnosis of acute Toxoplasma gondii infection have limitations in establishing the temporal diagnosis of acute toxoplasmosis. The present analytical-descriptive investigation comprises of a prospective longitudinal cohort study to search for accurate biomarkers to distinguish acute, early and late convalescent T. gondii infection. Classic methods (immunofluorescence-IFA along with Enzyme-linked immunosorbent-ELISA and fluorescent-ELFA assays) for IgM, IgA, IgG and IgG avidity were employed in parallel with flow cytometry-based anti-fixed T. gondii tachyzoites serology (FC-AFTA-IgM, IgG, IgG avidity and IgG subclasses). The results reemphasized the limitations of IgM & IgG IFA, IgG ELFA, IgG & IgG subclasses FC as well as IgA ELISA biomarkers for the temporal diagnosis of acute toxoplasmosis. Receiver Operating-characteristics features (ROC-curves) were employed to adjust conventional cut-offs aiming at establishing a novel protocol to discriminate more accurately the different phases of toxoplasmosis. Conversely, IgM presented high diagnostic co-positivity for acute toxoplasmosis (97% for ELISA, 96% for ELFA and 95% for FC-AFTA) along with moderate co-negativity for detection of late convalescent toxoplasmosis (82%, 76% and 79%, respectively). IgG avidity (ELFA and FC-AFTA) outstand with the highest performance indices with 91% and 96% co-negativity for assessing acute toxoplasmosis and 91% and 98% co-positivity for late convalescent toxoplasmosis, respectively. Multivariate analysis generated a three-step algorithm comprising IgM ELFA screening followed by ELFA and FC-AFTA IgG avidity with high accuracy in discriminating acute from late convalescent infection. Together, these findings demonstrate the applicability of the proposed panel of diagnostic tools for accurate temporal classification of T. gondii infection.