Arbovirus infections in humans can cause a wide range of symptoms, from asymptomatic infections to life-threatening conditions. Due to the short viremia in arbovirus infections, we often miss the diagnostic window for direct detection of the virus, but we can confirm the infection by detecting specific antibodies using various serological methods. The main limitation of serological methods is the high cross- reactivity between flaviviruses, which often makes it difficult to accurately identify the specific pathogen. This has prompted the development of new serological tools, such as chemiluminescence tests. We included 108 samples from patients with tick-borne meningoencephalitis, dengue, and West Nile fever, as well as 12 samples from healthy individuals in our master's thesis. To detect individual flavivirus infections, we used reference laboratory tests: Anti-TBE Virus ELISA IgM & IgG, Anti-Dengue Virus ELISA IgM & IgG (all Euroimmun, Lübeck, Germany), West Nile Virus IgG DxSelectTM ELISA and West Nile Virus IgM Capture DxSelectTM ELISA (Focus Diagnostics, California, USA). Samples were then analyzed using chemiluminescent monotests VirClia® (Vircell, Granada, Spain) for TBE, WNV and DENV. VirClia® for TBE showed 95 % agreement with the reference test for IgG antibodies and 82.9 % agreement for IgM antibodies. With VirClia® for DENV, the concordance was 96.3 % for IgG antibodies and 85 % for IgM antibodies. In samples from patients with WNV, the concordance between the tests was 100 %. We found that for TBEV and DENV IgG and for WNV, the reference test and the evaluated test concord perfectly. We also found strong cross-reactivity of IgG between flaviviruses, particularly between DENV and TBEV/WNV, which may limit the usefulness of the tests and require careful interpretation of the results, especially at borderline values.
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