Abstract
House dust mite is the chief allergen for atopic patients, and for environmental control, it is important to measure the level of this antigen in house dust of each patient's house. We investigated the usefulness of ACLOTEST, a new simple kit for detecting mite antigens in house dust. Using 61 dust samples gathered by electronic cleaner in 29 houses, there was a staistically significant relationship between Aclograde (5-grade classification of the results of ACLOTEST) and ELISA class (5-grade classification of Der I measured by sandwich ELISA), and the correlation coefficient was 0.602. Though larger quantity of dust sample is needed for ACLOTEST than for sandwich ELISA, ACLOTEST is simple, rapid, and requires no specific instrumentatients.
These observations suggest that ACLOTEST is useful as a simple method to detect the level of mite antigen in house dust samples by patients themselves.
