One hundred fifty six of stool samples were collected from patients suffering form diarrhea; the samples were classified according to the rural and urban areas, gender, age and immune status (pregnancy, diabetes, and corticosteroid therapy). Routine parasitological examinations were done to all samples using acidfast stain technique. Antigens detection method was also done by using ELISA. The acid fast technique results showed that 23 /156 (14.7%) were positive cases for identify Cryptosporidium oocyte in stool specimen, while the ELISA showed 82/156 (52.5%) were positive cases for identify Cryptosporidium antigen in stool specimen. The rural areas showed higher positive cases(17.5%) than urban areas and males' positive cases were higher results ( 18.7%) than females, while the results showed that lowest positive case were in age group 16-20 years (5.2%) and the highest case were in age group less than 5years (29.4%). Immune status (pregnancy, diabetes, and corticosteroid therapy) of patient showed an important role in the cases disruptions of the infection with Cryptosporidium spp.(17.6%, 29.8 % 27.6 %) respectively. The sensitivity, specificity of ELISA for identification Cryptosporidium antigens in stool specimen in comparison with the modified acid-fast staining method were determined 95%, 100% respectively, so it can be concluded that acid-fast technique which can be used as a referential diagnostic method has some limitations while the ELISA is more sensitive and specific for identification of the parasite antigens in stool specimens.
