Specificity
With a limited numberof treatment regimens available to HIV-1 patients, accurate monitoring of viral load levels is essential to establish and monitor effectiveness of therapeutic regimens, assess the potantial onset of drug resistance, and identify drug failure.
In testing a large seronegative population of over 500 samples the AMPLICOR HIV-1 MONITOR Test yielded a specificity greater than 99.5% (see Figure 2). This level of specificity provides an unmatched level of quality assurance and greatly reduces the need for time-consuming and expensive repeat testing1. In a similar study, bDNA technology exhibited exhibited specificity ranging from 91–96%, with some seronegative samples quantitating as high as 9,816 copies/mL2.
Figure 2. Specificity of UltraSensitive Assays.
Most important, the AMPLICOR HIV-1 MONITOR test reduces false positive results that could trigger unnecessary treatment changes and compromise long-term therapeutic management of patients.
