New collaboration between UNamur and Hôpitaux Iris Sud to support Covid-19 serology-based surveillance

Prof. Jonathan Douxfils and Prof. Jean-Michel Dogné from the Pharmacy Department of the UNamur started a new collaboration with the Department of Laboratory Medicine of Iris Hospitals South in order to establish guidance for appropriate implementation, validation and interpretation of SARS-CoV-2 serological testing.

Their jointly written Letter to the Editor discussing the role of the serology for COVID-19 control has just been released in the Journal of Infection. They discuss the importance of the type of population, the kinetics of the antibodies and the test performances for the proper evaluation of Covid-19 serology.
Moreover, this collaboration allowed the validation of the LIAISON®SARS-CoV-2 assay for detecting anti-SARS-CoV-2 IgG antibodies. Their retrospective validation study (Tré-Hardy et al., 2020) has just been published in Clinical Chemistry and Laboratory Medicine (CCLM). The authors report that the analytical and clinical performances are excellent, and that the automation of the test offers important rates, ideal for absorbing an extension of testing. Dr. Marie Tré-Hardy, pharmacist specialized in clinical biology at Iris Hospitals South, is also visiting lecturer at the Faculty of Medicine of the UNamur since September 2018, where she teaches clinical microbiology.