A mixed antiglobulin test with kidney cells in suspension for IgG antibody in human allograft recipients.

A modification of the mixed antiglobulin test for the detection of IgG antibodies directed against human kidney cells has been devised which uses a suspension of individual kidney cells rather than a monolayer culture as antigen so that it may be enployed clinically as a prospective crossmatch for organ transplantation. The antiglobulin reagent is added to the sensitized kidney cells rather than to the indicator erythrocytes, which reduces the background of nonspecific reations almost to zero. It is reproducible. The mixed antiglobulin test detected antibody in the sera of patients on chronic dialysis two to four times more frequently than did either the immune adherence test or the most sensitive modification of the microlymphocytotoxicity test which was utilized. It detected the development of antibody specific for donor kidney cells in the sera of 5 of 10 allograft receipients during periods of good to moderate renal transplant function several months before rejection.