Abstract
BackgroundHuman adenoviruses are common causes of community-acquired respiratory tract and enteric infections. Severe disseminated infections with high mortality rates may be seen in immunocompromised individuals. An accurate and cost-effective quantitative assay is essential not only for laboratory diagnosis of adenoviral infections, but also for monitoring of response to antiviral treatment. The diagnostic performance of an in-house quantitative polymerase chain reaction assay was compared to a commercial system.MethodsThe analytical sensitivity, specificity, linearity, precision and accuracy of an in-house adenovirus quantitative polymerase chain reaction assay were evaluated against the RealStar® Adenovirus PCR Kit (Altona Diagnostics GmbH, Hamburg, Germany), using 122 clinical specimens and 18 proficiency testing samples.ResultsLinear regression analysis of the quantitative results by the in-house assay showed the dynamic range from 2.60 to 9 log10 (plasma) and 2.94 to 9 log10 (viral transport medium) copies/mL, with the coefficient of determination (R2) of 0.996 and 0.998, respectively. A dilution series demonstrated the limits of detection and lower limits of quantification for plasma were 2.06 log10 and 2.60 log10 copies/mL and those for viral transport medium were 2.31 log10 and 2.94 log10 copies/mL respectively. The precision of the in-house assay was highly reproducible among runs with coefficients of variance ranging from 0.07 to 3.21% for plasma and 0.17% to 2.11% for viral transport medium. A comparison of 52 matched samples showed an excellent correlation between the quantitative viral loads measured by the in-house assay and the RealStar® Adenovirus PCR Kit (R2 = 0.984), with an average bias of − 0.16 log10 copies/mL.ConclusionsThe in-house adenovirus assay is a sensitive and reliable assay with lower cost for the detection and quantification of adenoviral DNA when compared to the RealStar® Adenovirus PCR Kit.
Highlights
Human adenoviruses are common causes of community-acquired respiratory tract and enteric infections
We have previously developed a quantitative PCR (qPCR) assay that can detect Human adenoviruses (HAdV) serotypes 11, 34, and 35 and shown that persistence of HAdV in the lower respiratory tract is common among immunocompromised hosts even without clinical adenoviral infections, and the viral load was correlated with low absolute lymphocyte counts [16]
Adenovirus PCR is included in a number of other commercial multiplex PCR systems for clinical diagnostics, and we have shown that some of the newer technologies such as the resequencing microarray could be used for the diagnosis of gastroenteritis and conjunctivitis due to HAdV [18, 19]
Summary
Human adenoviruses are common causes of community-acquired respiratory tract and enteric infections. Severe disseminated infections with high mortality rates may be seen in immunocompromised individuals. Human adenoviruses (HAdV) are common causes of community-acquired infections. As in the case of other viral respiratory pathogens, community outbreaks of adenovirus infections may occur, especially with respiratory tract infections and keratoconjunctivitis. Such outbreaks may carry substantial morbidity and mortality, in terms of severe respiratory tract involvement [1, 2]. Adenovirus infections may present as respiratory tract infection, hepatitis, enteritis, haemorrhagic cystitis, disseminated infections, and graft loss in organ transplant recipients. Disseminated disease in immunocompromised patients may carry a case-fatality ratio of more than 50% [3]
Sign-in/Register to view highlights & summary Sign-in/Register to access full text options 
Free) 
Talk to us
Join us for a 30 min session where you can share your feedback and ask us any queries you have
Schedule a call
