Development of an antigen-capture enzyme-linked immunosorbent assay for detection of enterovirus in commercial turkeys.

Diagnosis of enterovirus infection in turkey poults is currently done using electron microscopy. We have developed an antigen-capture enzyme-linked immunosorbent assay (ELISA) for use in diagnosis of enterovirus infection in turkey intestinal contents. Intestinal contents from naturally and experimentally infected turkey poults were evaluated for the presence of astrovirus and enterovirus by immune electron microscopy (IEM). The results were compared with the findings obtained using the ELISA for the presence of enterovirus. The ELISA, using the samples from the naturally infected poults, had a sensitivity of 0.963 and a specificity of 0.879. The Kappa value of 0.834 for the naturally infected samples and 0.97 for the experimentally infected samples showed excellent agreement between the ELISA and IEM for detection of enterovirus. Our results indicate that the ELISA is a rapid, sensitive, and specific method for diagnosis of turkey enterovirus infection.