Article ID | Journal | Published Year | Pages | File Type |
---|---|---|---|---|
8419776 | Journal of Immunological Methods | 2010 | 5 Pages |
Abstract
Significant hurdles remain to large-scale implementation of medical interventions in the developing world due to the lack of a modern diagnostic infrastructure. This is especially pertinent to the international roll-out of antiretroviral drugs to treat HIV, which ideally includes a CD4 T-cell count to determine eligibility. We designed a novel technique to estimate mature T-cell numbers by calculating the amount of rearranged T-cell receptor β genes from dried blood spots of HIV-infected individuals in the United States and Uganda. It was observed that the rearranged T-cell receptor β count correlated well with total lymphocyte counts from both study populations (Baltimore R = 0.602, Uganda R = 0.497; p < 0.001) and the ability for this measurement to determine antiretroviral initiation was similar to total lymphocyte counts, which can be used to determine eligibility in HIV + children. This technique as well as other dried blood spot based technologies could increase the diagnostic and monitoring capabilities in resource-limited settings.
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Authors
Andrew D. Redd, Emily J. Ciccone, Gertrude Nakigozi, Jeanne C. Keruly, Anthony Ndyanabo, Boaz Iga, Ronald H. Gray, David Serwadda, Thomas C. Quinn,