Screening arrangement for screening immunoassay tests and agglutination tests

A method of conducting and screening an agglutination test to identify the presence of an analyte in a sample, said test producing agglutination areas and background areas, said method comprising the steps of:

• mixing said sample with one or more agglutination reactants to form a sample and reactant mixture;
• flowing said sample and reactant mixture through a channel where an agglutination reaction or an agglutination pre-processing reaction occurs;
• receiving the mixture in a reaction chamber where the agglutination reaction occurs or is completed;
• illuminating said reaction chamber;
• detecting the intensity of light which is reflected from said agglutination areas and said background areas of said reaction chamber;
• representing the intensity of said detected light in a digitized data array;
• determining a threshold intensity by analyzing the distribution of pixel intensities across said data array to determine the intensity below or above which a pre-set percentage of pixels lie;
• thresholding said data array using the threshold intensity to distinguish between said background areas and said agglutination areas;
• identifying said agglutination areas;
• estimating the number of said agglutination areas;
• determining whether said agglutination areas exhibit a statistically significant result;
• and
• outputting said results.