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Published online by Cambridge University Press: 05 December 2011
Immunoassays have markedly enlarged the armamentarium of the clinical chemist during the last twenty years. Radioimmunoassays and their variants, in particular, now provide evidence which is central to diagnosis and patient management in endocrinology and certain other disorders. Currently used methods employ labelled antigens in the radioimmunoassay (RIA) method first described for insulin by Yalow and Berson. The advent of monoclonal antibodies seems to remove the one major barrier to the use of methods based upon labelled antibodies–the immunoradiometric (IRMA) method as proposed by Miles and Hales. These procedures offer advantages of speed, sensitivity, working range, specificity and robustness which strongly suggest that they will replace RIA for the microdetermination of specific proteins. Nevertheless, their specificity is based upon the recognition of a single epitope on the antigen and thorough testing on varied patient material will be required before they can safely be adopted for routine use.