(130g) A Novel Modified DOT Blot Approach for Early Detection of Osteoporosis on Cellulose Substrates

As the world population is aging at faster rate there is a growing number of lifestyle and non-communicable diseases severely affecting the quality of life in elderly people. Therefore, there is a great need of developing novel technological solutions to address these challenges for improving the quality of life. Among many, one such condition which is severely afflicting the lives of one in three women and one in five men aged fifty years and above is Osteoporosis, a silent killer. According to a survey, it is responsible for causing over 8.9 million fractures worldwide and despite its debilitating nature, the tests to detect Osteoporosis and therapeutic monitoring of the disease is not performed routinely due to high costs involved. The conventional methods use dual energy X-ray absorptiometry (DXA) usually located in centralized laboratories to measure the bone mineral density (BMD) costing up to 250 dollars per test which is unaffordable by many and hence not suitable for point of care testing and therapeutic monitoring of the disease. Therefore, it is imperative to develop a novel alternative method for early detection and monitoring of Osteoporosis. Here, we have developed an immunological technique by modifying the DOT BLOT method to estimate the bone turnover markers (i.e. bone absorption and resorption markers) such as Osteocalcin present in the blood on cellulose based substrates. The method consists of a colorimetric based indirect enzyme linked immunosorbent assay (ELISA) capable of detecting the Osteocalcin down to 6 ng/ml. The novel procedures being implemented here to modify the DOT BLOT method required extremely low reagent volumes and detects the protein markers in less than two hours of time as opposed to eight hours’ conventional procedure. Most importantly the newly developed procedure for detecting Osteoporosis on cellulose substrate with shorter analysis times to carry out at point of care settings significantly reduces the cost per unit test which further allows clinicians to monitor the therapeutic intervention during the disease condition would surely impact the lives of elderly population.