HIV-1 Quantitative PCR (Viral Load)

Microbiology

For determination of active ongoing infection, monitoring of longer term disease progression and response to antiviral therapies.

Blood sample (plasma)

Pink top EDTA (6ml)

For electronic requesting using EPIC (RDUH ONLY):

Search for: ‘HIV Quantitative PCR‘ or test code ‘LAB919‘

Samples from patients known to have blood transmissible viral infections should be clearly labelled “High Risk” or “Danger of Infection”.

Local test

7 days

Viral loads will be reported in copies/ml and where appropriate a log will be given.

Limit of Detection (LoD): 20 copies/mL

Lower Limit of Quantitation (LLoQ): 20 copies/mL

Upper Limit of Quantitation (ULoQ): 10,000,000 copies/mL

The conversion factor from copies per mL to International Units per mL is 0.6 copies:1 IU.

Roche Cobas 6800