Comparison of the AdvanSure™ real-time RT-PCR and Seeplex® RV12 ACE assay for the detection of respiratory viruses

The AdvanSure™ RV real-time PCR kit (AdvanSure; LG Life Sciences, Korea) is based on multiplex real-time PCR and can simultaneously detect 14 respiratory viruses. We compared the performance of the AdvanSure assay with the Seeplex RV 12 ACE detection kit (Seeplex; Seegene, Seoul, South Korea), a multiplex end-point PCR assay. A total of 454 consecutive respiratory specimens were tested with both AdvanSure and Seeplex assays; AdvanSure detected 153 (33.7%) positive cases and Seeplex detected 145 (31.9%) positive cases. The positive percent agreement, negative percent agreement, and kappa value for the two assays were 87.2% (95% CI, 80.3-92.1), 91.1% (95% CI, 87.2-93.9), and 0.77 (95% CI, 0.70-0.83), respectively. Compared with the Seeplex assay, the AdvanSure assay had a shorter turnaround time (3 h vs. 8 h) and a shorter hands-on time (<1 h vs 2 h). In conclusion, the AdvanSure assay demonstrated comparable performance to the Seeplex assay.