Abstract
Quantitation of the hepatitis C virus (HCV) provides a powerful epidemiologic and therapeutic method for the evaluation of infected patients. In this study semiquantitative reverse transcriptase polymerase chain reaction (PCR) is compared with a new branched DNA signal amplification methodology. Samples from HCV-infected patients as well as from human immunodeficiency virus-infected patients were evaluated. Reverse transcriptase PCR correlated well with the branched DNA assay (r = 0.7036, P < 0.05). HCV RNA was found to occur at significantly higher titers (P < 0.05) in patients coinfected with the human immunodeficiency virus compared with titers in those infected with HCV alone. Immune status as defined by the CD4+ count was not associated with the observed difference in viral titer.
Full text
PDF
Images in this article
Selected References
These references are in PubMed. This may not be the complete list of references from this article.
- Beach M. J., Meeks E. L., Mimms L. T., Vallari D., DuCharme L., Spelbring J., Taskar S., Schleicher J. B., Krawczynski K., Bradley D. W. Temporal relationships of hepatitis C virus RNA and antibody responses following experimental infection of chimpanzees. J Med Virol. 1992 Mar;36(3):226–237. doi: 10.1002/jmv.1890360314. [DOI] [PubMed] [Google Scholar]
- Chayama K., Saitoh S., Arase Y., Ikeda K., Matsumoto T., Sakai Y., Kobayashi M., Unakami M., Morinaga T., Kumada H. Effect of interferon administration on serum hepatitis C virus RNA in patients with chronic hepatitis C. Hepatology. 1991 Jun;13(6):1040–1043. [PubMed] [Google Scholar]
- Choo Q. L., Kuo G., Weiner A. J., Overby L. R., Bradley D. W., Houghton M. Isolation of a cDNA clone derived from a blood-borne non-A, non-B viral hepatitis genome. Science. 1989 Apr 21;244(4902):359–362. doi: 10.1126/science.2523562. [DOI] [PubMed] [Google Scholar]
- Di Bisceglie A. M., Shindo M., Fong T. L., Fried M. W., Swain M. G., Bergasa N. V., Axiotis C. A., Waggoner J. G., Park Y., Hoofnagle J. H. A pilot study of ribavirin therapy for chronic hepatitis C. Hepatology. 1992 Sep;16(3):649–654. doi: 10.1002/hep.1840160307. [DOI] [PubMed] [Google Scholar]
- Eyster M. E., Alter H. J., Aledort L. M., Quan S., Hatzakis A., Goedert J. J. Heterosexual co-transmission of hepatitis C virus (HCV) and human immunodeficiency virus (HIV). Ann Intern Med. 1991 Nov 15;115(10):764–768. doi: 10.7326/0003-4819-115-10-764. [DOI] [PubMed] [Google Scholar]
- Han J. H., Shyamala V., Richman K. H., Brauer M. J., Irvine B., Urdea M. S., Tekamp-Olson P., Kuo G., Choo Q. L., Houghton M. Characterization of the terminal regions of hepatitis C viral RNA: identification of conserved sequences in the 5' untranslated region and poly(A) tails at the 3' end. Proc Natl Acad Sci U S A. 1991 Mar 1;88(5):1711–1715. doi: 10.1073/pnas.88.5.1711. [DOI] [PMC free article] [PubMed] [Google Scholar]
- Ulrich P. P., Romeo J. M., Lane P. K., Kelly I., Daniel L. J., Vyas G. N. Detection, semiquantitation, and genetic variation in hepatitis C virus sequences amplified from the plasma of blood donors with elevated alanine aminotransferase. J Clin Invest. 1990 Nov;86(5):1609–1614. doi: 10.1172/JCI114882. [DOI] [PMC free article] [PubMed] [Google Scholar]
- Wang J. T., Wang T. H., Sheu J. C., Lin S. M., Lin J. T., Chen D. S. Effects of anticoagulants and storage of blood samples on efficacy of the polymerase chain reaction assay for hepatitis C virus. J Clin Microbiol. 1992 Mar;30(3):750–753. doi: 10.1128/jcm.30.3.750-753.1992. [DOI] [PMC free article] [PubMed] [Google Scholar]