ABSTRACT
PURPOSE: Mycoplasma pneumoniae is a common respiratory pathogen responsible for acute respiratory infections in young children. The standard laboratory methods for the specific diagnosis of M. pneumoniae infection have been isolation in culture and serological methods. The objective of this study was to compare the performance of enzyme-linked immunosorbent assays (ELISA) for the detection of M. pneumoniae specific IgG and IgM antibodies and polymerase chain reaction (PCR) in diagnosis of M. pneumoniae pneumonia. METHODS: For a 1-year period, 111 patients admitted to Severance Hospital and Yongdong Severance Hospital with clinical features of pneumonia and radiographically defined pneumonia were included. Serum specimens and throat swab specimens were obtained at the time of admission. Patients who showed M. pneumoniae antibody titer 1:320 or greater or a fourfold increase in M. pneumoniae antibody titer between acute and convalescent sera obtained 5 days to 3 weeks after the onset of illness were diagnosed as having M. pneumoniae pneumonia. PCR and ELISA were also performed. RESULTS: The sensitivity, specificity, false positivity, and false negativity of PCR were 40.6 percent, 63.3 percent, 69.1 percent, and 27.5 percent, respectively. The sensitivity, specificity, false positivity, and false negativity of ELISA IgM were 9.4 percent, 100 percent, 0 percent, and 26.9 percent, respectively. The sensitivity, specificity, false positivity, and false negativity of the use of PCR and ELISA in combination were 46.9 percent, 63.3 percent, 65.9 percent, and 25.4 percent, respectively. CONCLUSION: These observations suggest that the use of PCR and ELISA in addition to the detection of serum antibody to Mycoplasma pneumoniae using microparticle agglutination would allow the maximal number of diagnoses to be made at a very early phase of infection.