Tests for allergy to housedust

Abstract

To find a satisfactory combination of method and antigen extract for tests of [human] hypersensitivity to housedust, variations of skin test, RAST [radioallergosorbent test], histamine release and basophil degranulation tests have been used to test efficacy of 5 commonly used extracts of house dust or its components. The Lincoln Multitest for skin prick tests in its present form induced too much trauma for type-I hypersensitivity tests, though it had advantages for comparison of several extracts. Histamine release and 2 versions of basophil degranulation tests all gave good results but not consistently. RAST gave the best correlation between all extracts, but neither the in vivo nor in vitro tests gave perfect concordance with sensitivity in all patients and all extracts.