Serotyping of Haemophilus paragallinarum by the Page scheme: comparison of the use of agglutination and hemagglutination-inhibition tests

Seventy-two isolates of Haemophilus paragallinarum were serotyped according to the Page scheme, using a new hemagglutination-inhibition (HI) test. The results were compared with the plate agglutination method conventionally used in the Page scheme. The HI test used washed cells of H. paragallinarum, glutaraldehyde-fixed chicken erythrocytes, and rabbit antisera originally produced for the agglutination method. For 49 of the isolates, there was complete correlation between the results of the HI serotyping test and the previously performed agglutination test--23 were serovar A, two were serovar B, and 24 were serovar C. The other 23 isolates were nontypable by the agglutination test, but 21 of them could be serotyped by the HI method--six as serovar A, two as serovar B, and 13 as serovar C. Nine isolates required treatment of the bacterial cells with hyaluronidase for the expression of hemagglutination (HA) activity. Two isolates did not have HA activity despite hyaluronidase treatment and so could not be serotyped by the HI test.