Amid onslaught of dengue, the private pathology labs are cashing on the scare of the disease in provisional state capital. From the alarmed patients and their relatives, the pathology labs are charging anything between Rs 1,000 to Rs 1,500 for a test of dengue. In these labs the test of dengue is done on the basis of antigen presence in the blood sample of the patient and is called rapid test. The authenticity of this test is however not very reliable. A kit of rapid test costs around Rs 250 and the test report usually comes in 15 minutes. Due to the unreliable nature of the rapid test, the state health department accepts the report of Enzyme Linked Immunosorbent Assay (ELISA) test for dengue confirmation.
Senior Physician of Coronation hospital here, Dr N S Bisht said that the reports of rapid tests are not reliable and in many cases, the patients declared positive for dengue in the rapid test conducted by the private labs turned out to be wrong when the samples were tested for ELISA test. Elaborating about one such test report, Dr Bisht said that when he examined a patient of fever he found no symptoms of dengue but his test report showed him positive for dengue, typhoid and scrub typhus . He said that a patient cannot have these diseases simultaneously so his sample was tested again in government hospital which gave negative report for both dengue and typhoid. Dr Bisht added that the most of the private labs are needed to be checked for quality.
