J Lab Med Qual Assur.  2012 Dec;34(2):93-97.

Comparison of Rapid Antigen Test and Real-Time Reverse Transcription PCR for the Detection of Influenza B Virus

• Park MJ
• Kim HS
• Lee YK
• Kang HJ
• Kim JS
• Song W
• Lee KM

Abstract

BACKGROUND
Rapid antigen test and real-time reverse transcription PCR (rRT-PCR) are widely used for the detection of influenza A virus. In this study, we evaluated and compared the effectiveness of a rapid antigen test, currently used for detecting influenza B virus, with the effectiveness of using rRT-PCR for the same purpose.
METHODS
Samples obtained from 92 patients during an outbreak of influenza B were assessed using the rapid antigen test (SD BIOLINE Influenza Ag; SD, Korea) and rRT-PCR (Anyplex FluA/B Real-time Detection; Seegene, Korea).
RESULTS
The sensitivity and specificity of the rapid antigen test were 69% and 100%, respectively, in detecting influenza B when compared to rRT-PCR. Twenty-nine patients (31.5%) were positive for both rapid antigen test and rRT-PCR, while 50 (54.3%) were negative for both rapid antigen test and rRT-PCR. The overall concordance rate between rapid antigen test and rRT-PCR was 85.9%. Thirteen patients (14.1%) were positive only for rRT-PCR.
CONCLUSIONS
The rapid antigen test showed high specificity and good correlation with rRT-PCR and is likely to be as useful in the detection of influenza B viruses.

Keyword

Influenza B virus; Rapid antigen test; Real-time PCR

MeSH Terms

Humans
Influenza A virus
Influenza B virus
Influenza, Human
Polymerase Chain Reaction
Real-Time Polymerase Chain Reaction
Reverse Transcription
Sensitivity and Specificity