New Haven, Conn.--Yale and state scientists have developed a new, simpler and more reliable blood test to detect a recently discovered disease called ehrlichiosis, which is carried by deer ticks.
The test will make it less cumbersome for patients with the telltale flu-like symptoms to be screened for the disease. It also will allow researchers to determine whether ehrlichiosis may be as widespread as Lyme Disease in the Northeast.
The new ELISA test was developed by Dr. Jacob IJdo and Dr. Erol Fikrig in the Rheumatology section of Yale Medical School's Department of Internal Medicine in collaboration with Dr. Louis Magnarelli at the Connecticut Agricultural Experiment Station. Details of the test were published in the November issue of the Journal of Clinical Microbiology.
The organism, Ehrlichia equi, is carried by the same tiny deer tick that carries the Lyme Disease bacteria and, like Lyme Disease, causes flu-like symptoms such as headache, fever and muscle cramps. But unlike Lyme disease, Ehrlichia equi does not produce a bull's eye rash, which makes it more difficult to diagnose, said Dr. IJdo, a physician-scientist.
Another problem hampering diagnosis is that testing for ehrlichiosis is time-consuming, costly, and is only performed in specialized research laboratories. "With the old test a person could test two dozen blood samples a day," Dr. IJdo said. "With the new test it is easy to scale up the testing for large numbers of blood samples."
There are indications that ehrlichiosis infections could be more prevalent because the numbers of confirmed cases are increasing each year, Dr. IJdo said.
"The state of Connecticut started doing surveillance for ehrlichiosis in 1995, and each year the number of cases has doubled," he said. "Last year there were more than 200 cases in Connecticut."
Because the same tick is responsible for transmission of both organisms,
ehrlichiosis can be expected in the same areas where
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Contact: Jacqueline Weaver
jacqueline.weaver@yale.edu
203-432-8555
Yale University
21-Oct-1999