Premium
Use of (1→3)‐β‐ d ‐glucan for diagnosis and management of invasive mycoses in HIV ‐infected patients
Author(s) -
Farhour Zahra,
Mehraj Vikram,
Chen Jun,
Ramendra Rayoun,
Lu Hongzhou,
Routy JeanPierre
Publication year - 2018
Publication title -
mycoses
Language(s) - English
Resource type - Journals
SCImago Journal Rank - 1.13
H-Index - 69
eISSN - 1439-0507
pISSN - 0933-7407
DOI - 10.1111/myc.12797
Subject(s) - immunology , human immunodeficiency virus (hiv) , biology , immune system , medicine , intensive care medicine
Summary People living with HIV ( PLHIV ) are highly vulnerable to invasive fungal infections ( IFI s) due to their immune dysfunction. Diagnosis and treatment of IFI s remain challenging due to the requirement of deep tissue sampling to visualise and culture fungi before initiating treatment. Such techniques are less practical in resource‐limited settings due to their cost and requirement of relatively invasive procedures. Hence, identification of surrogate markers for the early diagnosis and therapeutic monitoring of IFI s is required. Recent studies have shown that (1→3)‐β‐ d ‐glucan ( BDG ), a major fungal cell wall antigen, represents a promising soluble marker for the presumptive diagnosis and therapeutic monitoring of IFI s in HIV ‐infected patients. Herein, we review findings on the merits of BDG assays in the diagnosis of IFI s and monitoring of antifungal therapies for PLHIV . Conversely to other types of immunocompromised patients, HIV infection is associated with gut damage and subsequent bacterial and fungal translocation leading to elevated BDG plasma levels.