Comparison of separated-lymphocyte and whole-blood lymphocyte proliferation assays for evaluating rabies-induced cellular immunity.

A whole-blood lymphocyte proliferation assay was compared to a standard method requiring the isolation of peripheral blood mononuclear cells (PBMC). Both methods were used to measure the cell-mediated immune responses to rabies in rabies-vaccine recipients. Whole-blood cells gave moderately higher lymphoproliferative responses in terms of stimulation indices than did separated-PBMC. The results obtained from these two methods can be considered equivalent for the purpose of quantitating cellular reactivity to rabies. The use of whole blood has advantages over the standard isolated-PBMC method.