Ana Or Fana Testing Questioning?

[looneymom]

I was looking over some of my son's past test results to see if either one of these test had ever been run. From what I can tell neither one has been done. Do these test identify autoimmune antibodies for just certain disorders? Or will it pick up on any autoimmune antibody in the human body? If anyone has a good article that explains what these test look for, I really like to read it.

Rachel

[davecom]

Hey Rachel,

From what I can tell ANA and its subtypes are run quite frequently when there is a suspicion of autoimmune disease. A positive test on its own is usually not definitive since some healthy people will have a positive result. However, a positive result along with symptoms can be diagnostic. I think the Wikipedia article is actually pretty good in this case:

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Anti-nuclear_antibody

For what it's worth, I know a lot of people on this board have had many ANAs tested (as have I).

[looneymom]

Thanks Dave for bringing this article to my attention. This article was a big help. When I email my son's cardiologist, I will ask if this test has been ran. He has been really good to run any testing that could bring us closer to an answer. We are all beginning to get the ideal that when my son spent 10 days in the children's hospital; the neurology team took over his case. If the test was not ordered by neurology, it didn't get ran. So we are having to do some back tracking with testing.

Rachel