![]() However, because some bands on the Western blot are more significant than others your doctor may decide you have Lyme disease even if your Western blot does not have the number of bands or specific bands recommended by the CDC. The CDC requires 5 out of 10 bands for a positive test result. If your blot has bands in the right places, and the right number of bands, it is positive. The lab compares the pattern produced by running the test with your blood to a template pattern representing known cases of Lyme disease. The read-out from the Western blot looks like a bar code. Labs performing a Western blot use electricity to separate proteins called antigens into bands. (Stricker Minerva 2010)īecause of this, LDo recommends the patients and physicians skip the ELISA and go straight to the Western blot. The two-tiered test system misses roughly 54% of patients. Unfortunately, the screening test is highly insensitive and fails to accurately identify patients who have Lyme disease. In Lyme disease, the second test is highly specific. They are accurate more than 99% of the time. HIV/AIDS is diagnosed with tests that are both highly sensitive and highly specific. Tests that do this well have high specificity. This test is followed by a second test that is intended to make sure that only people with the disease are diagnosed. Tests that do this well have are regarded as having high sensitivity. The first is a screening test that should detect anyone who might have the disease. Two-tiered Lyme disease testing uses two tests. Even later in the illness, the two-tiered testing is highly insensitive missing roughly half of those who have Lyme disease. The CDC recommends that doctors first order an ELISA to screen for Lyme disease and then confirm Lyme disease with a Western blot.ĭuring the first four-to-six weeks of Lyme infection, these Lyme disease tests are unreliable because most people have not yet developed the antibody response that the test measures. The two most-used antibody tests are the enzyme-linked immunosorbent assay (ELISA) and the Western blot. They measure the patient’s antibody response to the infection, not the infection itself. The most common Lyme disease tests are indirect ones.
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