The latex agglutination test is a laboratory test to check for the presence of certain antibodies or antigens in body fluids including saliva, urine, cerebrospinal fluid, or blood.
False positive results can occur due to an inability to differentiate non-specific aggregates of antigen particles only from true agglutinates comprising both antigen and antibody.
False negative results may be due to small clot size in sera with low antibody titers.
Possible causes of the latex agglutination test are listed in the table below:
Chronic polyarthritis
Felty syndrome
Lupus erythematosus
Periarteritis nodosa
Chronic hepatitis
Lupus hepatitis
Liver cirrhosis
Waldenstrom disease
Scleroderma
Dermatomyositis
Bechterew’s disease