IMPORTANT:

The presence of IFN activity in serum may make it impossible to test for anti-IFN antibodies.
To avoid this, it is essential that IFN is NOT administered to the patient within 24 hours of sampling (preferably 48-72 hours!).

Handling/storage:
Since antibodies are being tested, the handling of samples is relatively simple.

Serum:
-10 ml blood is drawn by sterile venipuncture; collect in a sterile tube without anticoagulant. To avoid 'intrinsic' IFN actitvity, please draw the sample immediately before next IFN injection, or several days after last IFN injection.
- Avoid prolonged storage at room temperature and avoid heating the tube. Serum should be isolated by brief centrifugation within 1 hour. The supernatnat is transferred to a sterile plastic tube; minimum 3 ml is required.
- Keep the serum sample at -20°C
(if thawing and infection is avoided, serum antibodies are stable for years at -20°C).

Shipment:
Serum samples must be sent frozen (with plenty of dry ice). They must be received at IIR on Tuesdays, Wednesdays, Thursdays, and NOT on holidays:

Att. Ole Christensen/Merete Tjalve
BioMonitor ApS
Symbion Science Park, Fruebjergvej 3, DK-2100 Copenhagen, Denmark.

Before shipment, send an email to Ole Christensen oc@biomon.dk with information:
- Date of intended shipment.
- Address, phone, fax and email of a person to contact during shipment.
- Number of samples plus sample ID's
(please be careful with the sample ID's; these are being used for ID of the test results).
- Address, phone, fax and email of the person to receive the test results
(normally within 4-6 weeks).
- Information on whom to send the invoice
(samples will not be processed unless this information is provided).
- We can test for antibody against the IFN-beta type used for therapy
PLEASE GIVE APPROPRIATE INFORMATION

KB 2003