Objectives: To compare multiplex fluorescent PCRwith serum type-specific antibody detection in thediagnosis of herpes simplex virus (HSV) infection andto evaluate its significance in the diagnosis of genitalherpes.Methods: We detected HSV infection in 121 speci-mens collected from patients with genital herpesusing both multiplex fluorescent PCR and serum type-specific antibody detection. HSV viral isolation wasused as the standard control.Results: When compared with the viral isolation, thesensitivity and specificity for multiplex fluorescentPCR were 100% and 88.89%, respectively afterdiscrepant analysis. The sensitivity and specificity fortype-specific antibody detection was 77.68 % and77.78 %, respectively. However, the type-specificantibody detected HSV in two asymptomatic patientswhile the multiplex fluorescent PCR couldn’t detectany HSV DNA from those specimens.Conclusions: Multiplex fluorescent PCR is a verysensitive and specific method for detection and typingof HSV in the lesion of genital herpes, it failed todetect HSV DNA from the asymptomatic patients.Serum type-specific antibody detection was a lesssensitive and specific test but could detect the specificantibody from some asymptomatic patients. Thecombination of these two techniques would allow rapid,sensitive and accurate detection and typing of HSVand help clinical diagnosis and epidemiologic survey-ing of genital herpes.
Objective: To study the sensitivity and the specific-ity of the condyloma acuminata acetowhitening test.Methods: We placed gauzes soaked with 5% aceticacid onto the lesions for 3 to 5 minutes, then removedthe gauzes and observed the result of acetowhitening. Results: 165 of 211(78.2%) patients tested positive.159 patients had condyloma acuminata and 134 of themhad a positive acetowhitening test (84.3%). Of the 26patients with candida balanitis, 25 cases were positivewith a positive rate of 96.2%.Conclusions: The high sensitivity and specificity ofthe condyloma acuminata acetowhitening test justifythe use of this test in the clinical setting. However, thecondyloma acuminata acetowhitening test has someshortcomings and these must be considered duringdiagnosis.
