Herpes simplex virus (HSV) is associated with a spectrum of diseases ranging from sub-clinical infection to systemic disease. The need for rapid diagnosis of HSV infection is dictated by (1) the prevalence of HSV as a causative agent in sexually transmitted disease (2) the role of HSV is perinatal infection (3) the promising results obtained with anti-viral therapy. The sensitivity of conventional tissue culture method for the isolation of HSV has been significantly improved by a shell vial method using direct immunoperoxidase stain as detecting method. The shell vial method requires 18 to 48 hours incubation and a 2- hour staining step. The Virogen Herpes slide test (Wamploe laboratories) is a rapid latex agglutination test designed to use as a tissue culture confirmation test and direct antigen detection test in clinical specimens. Our data using this kit indicated that Virogen is a very specific test but not sufficiently sensitive to use either as a tissue culture confirmation test or a direct antigen detection test in clinical specimens.
