A study on the behaviour of leprosy in serological tests for syphilis.

Blood samples from 58 leprosy patients were tested by the MK1R and VDRL slide tests, the latter being performed on normally inactivated sera and on the same sera heated for 5 minutes at 65 degrees C. The MK1R test showed fewer false positive reactions than the VDRL test on normally inactivated sera. The VDRL test on the "overheated" sera, however, gave the same results as the MK1R test. This may be due to the thermostable factor being removed by the NaCl used in the MK1R test (3.5%) and by overheating in the variant method for the VDRL test.