Very often, patients leave the office with square eyes, looking at a bunch of test forms in their hands. Complete blood count and urinalysis do not raise questions, but all the rest!
For example, blood on RPGA. What are those strange letters? Why take "extra" blood when everything is already clear?
It only seems to the patient that everything is clear, but the doctor needs this analysis in order to make a diagnosis.
What is this clever analysis?
If they gave a referral with these strange letters on the form "for RPGA", what will this mean? This study is not ordered for routine diagnosis.
The analysis is very specific. It is done to determine the stage of syphilis. In the case when the generally accepted analysis for RW - the Wasserman reaction - turned out to be positive, or the doctor doubts that his indicator is reliable. The doctor needs the values of TPHA to prescribe adequate therapy.
What is the essence of RPGA?
For those who want to learn more about RPGA - what is it, we giveanswer. This is a specific treponemal test. Speaking in medical language, not entirely clear to ordinary people, it is a reaction of passive hemagglutination.
It was based on the fact that the agglutination of red blood cells, on the surface of which the causative agent of syphilis, called pale treponema or spirochete, found shelter, occurs with the formation of treponemal antibodies.
Agglutination is a process in which bacteria, viruses and other foreign inclusions precipitate from the composition of the blood taken for analysis under the influence of special reagents.
The more erythrocytes with treponema embedded in them settle, the higher the stage of infection.
What is syphilis?
Even faced with a disease like syphilis, not everyone can understand how serious it is and what it is fraught with.
It's a venereal disease. You can get infected:
- through saliva;
- through vaginal secretion;
- through sperm;
- domestic way in the presence of damage to the surface of the skin;
- syphilis can be transmitted to a child through the milk of a sick mother.
At the first stage of infection, chancres appear - dense formations or ulcers, then they disappear.
The secondary stage is characterized by a rash and swollen lymph nodes.
The third and fourth stages of this unpleasant disease can be expressed in damage to the brain, cardiovascular system, bone destruction and other pathological changes in the body.
If a pregnant woman has syphilis, then children are born with acute pathologies that affect almost all vital systems.
If the doctor has prescribed a blood test for RPHA, what it is can be clarified for general development, but such a serious analysis cannot be brushed aside! Syphilis requires mandatory treatment.
Those who have this disease pose a serious danger to others.
Express diagnostics of the disease - the Wassermann reaction or RW - must be done by everyone who gets a job or goes to a hospital for treatment.
How to read the analysis results?
The analysis was handed over, and a form with incomprehensible numbers was handed out. For example, RPGA - 1/320. What could this mean?
The numbers are written on the form in the event that a pale treponema is found in the body. If it is not there, then the word "negative" will be written there. This means that the disease is absent, even if the Wassermann test was positive.
RPHA shows the disease not earlier than 4 weeks after the introduction of treponema into the body, that is, after the end of the incubation period.
The numbers of the value are the credits.
| Initial stage | 1/320 |
| Secondary syphilis | < 1/320 |
| Hidden | > 1/320 |
An analysis of RPHA will be positive for many years after syphilis is cured.
This is interesting
The topic is specific, but syphilis is not an easy infection either. Fear of contracting it can poison life. Positive RPHA and RW are so unsettling that it makes some particularly nervous patients contemplate suicide.
No need to immediately panic! For example, the Wasserman reaction can show the presence of syphilis during pregnancy, with tonsillitis and some other diseases. It is to clarify whether there is a disease, and additional tests are taken, one of which is RPHA - a blood test that accurately shows whether there is treponema in the body, and what stage the disease has.
But this study may also be inaccurate in some inflammatory diseases of the internal organs. False-positive RPHA - what can it mean besides syphilis? For example, acute inflammation of the spleen.
Therefore, having received the primary results, there is no need to panic. There is a possibility that after a second blood donation, the result will be negative.
If several specific blood tests for syphilis show a positive result, only then the infection is considered 100%.
Therefore, a comprehensive examination is carried out. It consists of:
- Wasserman reactions;
- RPGA;
- ELISA - enzyme immunoassay;
- RIBT, which detects syphilis in the absence of external symptoms in the later stages.
Unfortunately, syphilis is a disease that can be contracted several times. Immunity after the disease does not appear.
