stercoralis detection selleck chemicals llc was significantly higher than the sensitivity of the PCR (47.1% versus 17.4%; P < 0.001). The specificity of the Baermann method was 78.4%, and the specificity of PCR was 93.9%. Table 2 Diagnostic accuracy of duplicate Kato�CKatz thick smears, FLOTAC dual technique, and real-time PCR for hookworm and the Baermann method and PCR for S. stercoralis detection as well as prevalence according to three different statistical approaches ... Accuracy estimates of diagnostic methods using a pseudo-gold standard. As shown in Table 2, when applying a combination of the available test results (duplicate Kato�CKatz thick smears, FLOTAC, and PCR) as a diagnostic pseudo-gold standard, the sensitivity for hookworm diagnosis was highest for FLOTAC (83.3%) followed by Kato�CKatz thick smear (75.

0%), and PCR (73.6%). For the diagnosis of S. stercoralis, the Baermann method showed a better sensitivity (83.6%) than PCR (30.9%). Accuracy estimates of diagnostic methods in the absence of a true gold standard using a Bayesian approach. For the comparison of the FLOTAC and Kato�CKatz methods, the two dependence parameters were close to zero, and therefore, we report the following results under the assumption of conditional independence. As shown in Table 2, in the absence of a gold standard, FLOTAC had the highest sensitivity for hookworm detection compared with Kato�CKatz thick smear (96.3% versus 89.6%) and PCR (88.8% versus 83.3%). The sensitivities of Kato�CKatz thick smear (79.2%) and PCR (78.8%) were estimated to be almost equal. The estimated specificity of the PCR was 96.

2% compared with FLOTAC and 92.7% compared with duplicate Kato�CKatz thick smears. For the diagnosis of S. stercoralis, both the Baermann method and PCR showed low sensitivity (28.3% and 11.6%, respectively). The specificity of PCR was higher than the specificity of the Baermann method (90.6% versus 75.2%). Discussion The upscale of control interventions against neglected tropical diseases over the next years in accordance with the WHO goals set for the year 2020 will likely reduce the prevalence and intensities of soil-transmitted helminth infections in endemic countries. For the decisions of where to implement, when to stop control interventions, and how to implement adequate surveillance to avoid the recrudescence of soil-transmitted helminthiases, sensitive diagnostic methods are needed.

52 For the first time GSK-3 to our knowledge, we compared the diagnostic accuracy of the FLOTAC with a previously described real-time PCR assay for hookworm diagnosis, applying three different statistical approaches, and we found that FLOTAC was slightly more sensitive than PCR. When directly comparing each of the techniques with the Kato�CKatz method, only FLOTAC and not PCR had a significantly higher sensitivity. The sensitivity of the PCR for S. stercoralis diagnosis was significantly lower than the sensitivity of the Baermann method.