Patent ID: 7618792

Claim:
A method for detecting and identifying alloantibodies in a blood sample, comprising: generating a set of several differently encoded red blood cells or red blood cell ghosts displaying antigens on the cell surface whose identities are known, such that differently encoded red blood cells or red blood cell ghosts in the set are antigenically distinct from other red blood cells or red blood cell ghosts in the set; wherein said differently encoded cells or ghosts contain two or more fluorescent dyes mixed at different predetermined ratios which upon excitation exhibit distinct fluorescent emission signals, wherein the ratio of the fluorescent emission signals is governed by said predetermined ratio and wherein the presence of the fluorescent dye does not substantially alter the antigenicity of the cells or ghosts; contacting said set with said blood sample under conditions permitting binding of said alloantibodies present in the sample to the antigens on the cell surface; removing the excess blood sample components from contact with the set thereby leaving alloantibody bound to the antigens on the cell surface; detecting the presence of the bound alloantibody on red blood cells or red blood cell ghosts using a labeled secondary antibody that binds to alloantibodies captured by the red blood cells or red blood cell ghosts by determining the presence of signals from the labeled secondary antibody; determining the ratio of fluorescent encoding signals associated with different red blood cells or red blood cell ghosts; and correlating the signals from the labeled secondary antibody with the ratio of fluorescent encoding signal for red blood cells or red blood cell ghosts; and determining the identity of the alloantibody.