Innovative Blood Test Outperforms Standard Diagnostics for Lyme Disease Detection

A novel blood test for Lyme disease demonstrates superior accuracy compared to traditional diagnostic methods across all disease stages, according to data presented at the 2025 Annual Meeting of the Association for Diagnostics and Laboratory Medicine in Chicago. This innovative assay combines multiplexed antigen detection with advanced machine learning algorithms, achieving over 90% accuracy in a study involving 308 human serum samples. Every year, approximately 476,000 Americans are diagnosed and treated for Lyme disease, primarily caused by Borrelia burgdorferi transmitted through tick bites. Early detection is crucial for effective treatment, but diagnosing the disease in its initial phase remains challenging, especially since the most recognizable sign—a bull's-eye skin rash called erythema migrans—is not always present. Early diagnosis hurdles include the variability of rash presentation; about 30% of infected individuals do not develop any rash. Consequently, clinicians often rely on serological tests, which are less sensitive during the initial weeks because antibodies take time to develop. The standard two-tier testing approach involves an enzyme immunoassay followed by a...