COMPARISON OF EFFICIENCY OF THE RAPID WHOLE BLOOD AGGLUTINATION TEST WITH THE SERUM AGGLUTINATION TEST FOR PULLORUM DISEASE
The results obtained with the rapid whole blood agglutination test for pullorum disease, applied in the field, agree closely with the results secured with the rapid serum agglutination test, applied in the laboratory.The accuracy of the diagnosis was found to depend upon the training and experience of the technician. When the whole blood agglutination test was applied by inexperienced persons, the results obtained differed from the laboratory test by 12% as compared with a difference of 1.3% when the whole blood agglutination test was applied by an experienced technician.The rapid whole blood agglutination test was found to lend itself very readily to practical application in the field. The extremely low cost makes feasible the application and repetition of the test on a large scale.Since it is known from previous work that one agglutination test will not eliminate all carriers of pullorum disease, the rapid whole blood agglutination test should be applied several times a year until at least two successive negative tests are obtained on each bird of the flock.