In our study, the addition of HIV RNA screening to routine HIV antibody testing in STD clinics identified a substantial increased proportion of HIV-infected persons at high risk for further HIV transmission, who would have been missed by routine HIV counseling and testing protocols. Further evaluation of the addition of HIV RNA screening to routine HIV antibody testing is warranted.

No abstract

The use of culture-independent diagnostic tests (CIDTs), such as stool antigen tests, as standalone tests for the detection of Campylobacter in stool is increasing. We conducted a prospective, multicenter study to evaluate the performance of stool antigen CIDTs compared to culture and PCR for Campylobacter detection. Between July and October 2010, we tested 2,767 stool specimens from patients with gastrointestinal illness with the following methods: four types of Campylobacter selective media, four commercial stool antigen assays, and a commercial PCR assay. Illnesses from which specimens were positive by one or more culture media or at least one CIDT and PCR were designated "cases." A total of 95 specimens (3.4%) met the case definition. The stool antigen CIDTs ranged from 79.6% to 87.6% in sensitivity, 95.9 to 99.5% in specificity, and 41.3 to 84.3% in positive predictive value. Culture alone detected 80/89 (89.9% sensitivity) Campylobacter jejuni/Campylobacter coli-positive cases. Of the 209 noncases that were positive by at least one CIDT, only one (0.48%) was positive by all four stool antigen tests, and 73% were positive by just one stool antigen test. The questionable relevance of unconfirmed positive stool antigen CIDT results was supported by the finding that noncases were less likely than cases to have gastrointestinal symptoms. Thus, while the tests were convenient to use, the sensitivity, specificity, and positive predictive value of Campylobacter stool antigen tests were highly variable. Given the relatively low incidence of Campylobacter disease and the generally poor diagnostic test characteristics, this study calls into question the use of commercially available stool antigen CIDTs as standalone tests for direct detection of Campylobacter in stool. Campylobacter infection continues to be a major public health problem. Campylobacter jejuni and Campylobacter coli are pathogens transmitted commonly through food, causing an estimated 1.3 million cases of illness per year in the United States (1), and yet diagnosis can be challenging because the organism is difficult to isolate, grow, and identify. Recent reports describing clinical laboratory practices for Campylobacter diagnostics in Pennsylvania (2) and the Foodborne Diseases Active Surveillance Network (FoodNet) sites (3) highlight the wide range of testing practices in use; currently, no best-practice clinical or public health laboratory guidelines exist for laboratory diagnosis of Campylobacter infections. Direct plating onto a Campylobacter selective medium, followed by incubation at 42°C under microaerobic conditions for 72 h, has long been considered the "gold standard" for diagnosis (4).The use of culture-independent diagnostic tests (CIDTs) for Campylobacter testing on stool samples is increasing, which may have important implications for both patient management and public health surveillance efforts (5). Stool antigen tests to directly detect Campylobacter in fecal samples are fast and generate sameday results, but concerns regarding speci...

Syphilis epidemics in MSM may be contributing to HIV incidence in this population. The STARHS can be applied as a surveillance tool to assess HIV incidence in various at-risk populations, but further studies are necessary for validation.

No abstract

In July 2017, fever and sepsis developed in 3 recipients of solid organs (1 heart and 2 kidneys) from a common donor in the United States; 1 of the kidney recipients died. Tularemia was suspected only after blood cultures from the surviving kidney recipient grew Francisella species. The organ donor, a middle-aged man from the southwestern United States, had been hospitalized for acute alcohol withdrawal syndrome, pneumonia, and multiorgan failure. F. tularensis subsp. tularensis (clade A2) was cultured from archived spleen tissue from the donor and blood from both kidney recipients. Whole-genome multilocus sequence typing indicated that the isolated strains were indistinguishable. The heart recipient remained seronegative with negative blood cultures but had been receiving antimicrobial drugs for a medical device infection before transplant. Two lagomorph carcasses collected near the donor’s residence were positive by PCR for F. tularensis subsp. tularensis (clade A2). This investigation documents F. tularensis transmission by solid organ transplantation.

We have investigated the acute changes in cytokine gene expression patterns and immune status in vivo and ex vivo in a patient on chronic hemodialysis with cuprophane membranes before and after two hemodialysis sessions with either cuprophane or polysulfone membranes. Results show that both dialyzer membranes have differential acute effects on the immune system and that the concomitant use of reverse-transcriptase-coupled polymerase chain reaction, solid-phase and radioimmunoassays, and flow-cytometric analysis may be useful in the longitudinal assessment of patients on chronic hemodialysis.