Syphilis: mimicking yet another disease!
- M Poulton1,
- S Curtis2,
- D McElborough2,
- D I Williams3,
- M Fisher3
- 1Department of GUM/HIV, Brighton Health Care NHS Trust
- 2Department of Microbiology/PHLS, Brighton
- 3Department of GUM/HIV, Brighton Health Care NHS Trust
- Dr Mary Poulton, The Greenway Centre, Department of GUM/HIV, Newham General Hospital, Glen Road, London E13 8SL, UK
- Accepted 2 August 2001
Editor,—Owing to a higher risk of HIV transmission during seroconversion and a rise in the transmission of resistant HIV,1 it is becoming increasingly important to diagnose primary HIV infection (PHI).2 However, the diagnosis can be difficult to make as there is a wide differential diagnosis and conventional HIV antibody tests do not become positive until an average of 8 weeks after infection. HIV p24 antigen tests become positive at an earlier stage and are often used as part of a combined screening test for suspected PHI. These combined tests detect p24 antigenaemia, anti-HIV-1, and anti-HIV-2 antibodies and can assist in earlier diagnosis of HIV. We would like to …
