The importance of radio-allergo-sorbent-test in comparison with intracutaneous test in diagnosis of allergic diseases.

A comparison of clinical skin-tesing using the prick-test and the intracutaneous test with the radio-allergo-sorbent-test (RAST) in 167 patients with different immediate-type allergies showed concordant results in 75.7 per cent of the cases. In 20 per cent of the cases, the skin-test was positive while the simultaneous RAST was negative. Results in male and female patients did not show any important difference. The two test methods agreed well with selected antigens, e.g. grass-pollen, animal-epithelium, fungi and egg white; whereas, the two methods showed considerably different results using tree pollen and housedust as antigens.