[Human recombinant tissue-transglutaminase antibodies: evaluation of a commercial kit and comparison of methods using guinea pig antigen]. / Anticorpi anti tranglutaminasi tissutale ricombinante umana. Valutazione di un kit commerciale e studio comparativo con metodi che utilizzano antigene da cavia.

AIM: The tissue-Trans-Glutaminase (t-TG) has been reported to be the target for endomysial antibodies in coeliac disease. Coeliac disease if untreated, although clinically silent, predispose for other autoimmune disease, large scale screening methods are needed for an early diagnosis. The recently introduced ELISA methods to detect tTG antibodies, that used as antigen Guinea Pig tissue transglutaminase provide an efficient alternative to the anti-endomysial (EMA) immunofluorescent method and are suitable for screening. Our aim was to compare the commercial kit utilizing tTG from guinea pig (GP-tTG) to the standard method that we developed in our laboratory and with the new method that employed human recombinant tTG (hr-tTG). METHODS: We tested serum samples from 16 untreated celiac patients, 10 coeliac patients in gluten free diet, 22 subjects with other disease and 32 healthy controls, for a total number of 80 sera, with 3 commercial kit which employed GP-tTG and 1 that employed hr-tTG, as reference method we used an ELISA method developed in our laboratory and the immunofluorescence method to detect EMA. RESULTS: Results show that methods employing human tTG had a sensibility of 100% with a specificity of 98% and a predictive value of 94%, instead methods employing GP-tTG show inferior results. CONCLUSION. We conclude that is better using hr-tTG as antigen in screening methods for coeliac disease.

[Binding capacity of albumin with bromcresol green in a group of women of fertile age]. / Studio della capacita legante dell'albumina con verde di bromocresolo in un gruppo di donne in età fertile.

Albumin binding ability was studied in 551 women of fertile age through the dye-binding test with BCG. In 61 cases (11.0%) no binding was found: 47 women (77.0%) were pregnant at the time the blood test was performed. Such a result agrees with previous studies which indicate a reduced albumin binding ability in the blood of near term pregnant women and in the umbilical cord.