Evaluation of cobas Influenza A/B & RSV Test for Diagnosis of Equine Influenza.

The research paper discusses the use and evaluation of the cobas Influenza A/B & RSV Test in diagnosing equine influenza, showing that it is both rapid and sensitive in detecting the virus, but could benefit from improvements to reduce invalid results.

Objective of The Research

• The main objective of the study was to assess the effectiveness of the cobas Influenza A/B & RSV Test in diagnosing equine influenza.
• The researchers aimed to identify a rapid and sensitive diagnostic tool to help prevent the spread of the equine influenza virus.

Methods and Approaches

• The cobas Influenza A/B & RSV test was used in this research. This test is designed for the cobas Liat system, a product of Roche Diagnostics.
• The test uses real-time reverse transcription polymerase chain reaction (RT-PCR), a technique used to amplify and quantify specific DNA molecules.
• The test is designed to broadly detect influenza A virus RNA within a duration of 20 minutes.

Findings

• This study reported that the cobas Influenza A/B & RSV Test could detect a wide range of equine influenza virus strains.
• It could also detect equine influenza virus RNA from nasal swabs of infected horses at a similar level as real-time reverse transcription polymerase chain reaction (RT-PCR).
• However, the Test returned some invalid results, accounting for 7.7% of all tests, which may affect its accuracy.

Implications

• The findings suggest that the cobas Influenza A/B & RSV test is highly sensitive to the equine influenza virus.
• However, the study also highlighted areas of improvement, mainly to reduce the rate of invalid results to enhance the test’s accuracy and reliability.