Intravitam diagnosis of rabies from saliva by nested RT-PCR and real time PCR

Nested reverse transcription (RT)-PCR and SYBR Green real time PCR protocols for the intravitam detection of rabies virus genomic RNA were tested with clinical samples for the first time from rabies suspected animals (n=12). With SYBR Green real time PCR, five saliva samples were detected as positive, hence confirming that, for the sake of antemortem detection of rabies in saliva of animals, the sensitivity of real time PCR is more than that of RT-PCR as well as immunofluorescence that could detect rabies in three saliva samples each.

Antemortem diagnosis of rabies from skin: comparison of nested RT-PCR with TaqMan real time PCR

Molecular techniques were adopted to diagnose rabies viral RNA from skin biopsy samples collected from 20 animals. Nested RT-PCR and TaqMan real time PCR techniques have successfully diagnosed rabies viral RNA in 9 and 11 skin samples, respectively. The sensitivity of both techniques was calculated in comparison to FAT applied on brain samples. Sensitivity of 76.47% was obtained with nested RT-PCR on skin biopsy samples while Taqman real time PCR revealed sensitivity of 92.85%. It was concluded that TaqMan real time PCR is a useful, specific, sensitive and better molecular approach for antemortem rabies diagnosis from skin samples of rabies suspected animals.