This test can be administered only by a physician, and positive results require confirmation by a standard serologic test. The supplier has included a pretest counseling form, which should be read to and initialed by the patient prior to administration. None of these tests is considered superior to routine serology in terms of accuracy, but some may be useful in patients with confusing serologic test results, when there is a need to clarify indeterminate test results, for virologic monitoring in therapeutic trials, and for HIV detection when routine serologic tests are likely to be misleading such as in patients with agammaglobulinemia, acute retroviral infection, neonatal HIV infection, and patients in the window following viral exposure. In most cases, confirmation of positive serology is accomplished simply by repeat serology. None of these tests should replace serology to circumvent the informed consent process.
Advantage is avoidance of phlebotomy.
Must be administered by a physician. Expensive and labor-intensive. May be qualitative or quantitative. Main use of qualitative technique is viral isolation for further analysis and for HIV detection in infants. Main use is for viral detection in the case of neonatal HIVand disputed or indeterminate serologic tests.