Pseudorabies Diagnosis
Information about how the disease is diagnosed.
The clinical signs of pseudorabies infection may include encephalitis. However, the clinical signs are variable so diagnosis should always be confirmed by laboratory tests.
- In living pigs, the pseudorabies virus (PRV) can be isolated from the oro-pharyngeal fluid, nasal fluid (swabs) or tonsil biopsies.
- For post-mortem diagnosis, the PRV can be isolated from brain and tonsil tissues.
The isolation of PRV makes it possible to confirm pseudorabies, but failure to isolate does not guarantee freedom from infection.
Four tests have been approved for the diagnosis of pseudorabies:
- the Serum-Virus Neutralization Test (SN)
- Virus Isolation (VI)
- Fluorescent Antibody Tissue Section Tests (FATS)
- Enzyme Linked Immune-Sorbent Assay (ELISA)
