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Efficiency of the polymerase chain reaction for the detection of human immunodeficiency virus type (HIV‐1) DNA in the lymphocytes of infected persons: Comparison to antigen‐enzyme‐linked immunosorbent assay and virus isolation
Author(s) -
Stoeckl Elisabeth,
Barrett Noel,
Heinz Franz X.,
Banekovich Michael,
Stingl Georg,
Guggenberger Klaus,
Dorner Friedrich,
Kunz Christian
Publication year - 1989
Publication title -
journal of medical virology
Language(s) - English
Resource type - Journals
SCImago Journal Rank - 0.782
H-Index - 121
eISSN - 1096-9071
pISSN - 0146-6615
DOI - 10.1002/jmv.1890290406
Subject(s) - virology , polymerase chain reaction , virus , primer (cosmetics) , biology , antigen , reverse transcriptase , dna , viral disease , microbiology and biotechnology , gene , immunology , chemistry , genetics , organic chemistry
Seventy‐one human immunodeficiency virus type (HIV‐1)‐positive patients were investigated by polymerase chain reaction (PCR), virus isolation, and antigen detection for the existence of HIV in blood. The identification of HIV DNA by PCR, using three different pairs of primers, yielded a clearly higher detection rate (86%) than with two primer pairs (75%) and was far more sensitive than virus isolation (45%) and antigen ELISA (14%). The PCR‐negative results were clearly correlated to asymptomatic clinical stages. However, there was a limited correlation between the clinical stage of disease and the amount of HIV DNA that could be detected in equal numbers of CD4 + cells from different patients, which might be due to their treatment with azido‐thymidine (AZT).