OBJECTIVE To estimate the incidence of HIV seroconversion among women following pregnancy and delivery. DESIGN A prospective cohort of women who were HIV negative at recruitment on first antenatal care visit. MATERIALS AND METHODS Pregnant women were invited to undergo voluntary confidential HIV counselling and blood draw for HIV testing during the first antenatal care visit as part of a pr...

BACKGROUND AND AIMS Lamivudine induces favourable virological and biochemical responses but post-treatment relapses are frequent, even in patients with hepatitis B e antigen (HBeAg) loss or seroconversion. The aim of this study was to determine whether extended lamivudine therapy for up to 12 months after HBeAg loss/seroconversion could decrease the risk of post-treatment virological relapse. I...

BACKGROUND Few data exist on tuberculosis (TB) incidence according to time from HIV seroconversion in high-income countries and whether rates following initiation of a combination of antiretroviral treatments (cARTs) differ from those soon after seroconversion. METHODS Data on individuals with well estimated dates of HIV seroconversion were used to analyse post-seroconversion TB rates, ending...

Nucleos(t)ide analogues rarely result in a durable off-treatment response in chronic hepatitis B infection, whereas pegylated interferon (Peg-IFN) induces a long-lasting response only in a subset of patients. We assessed the effect of sequential combination therapy with Peg-IFN-α2a and entecavir in hepatitis B e antigen (HBeAg)-positive patients with prior long-term entecavir therapy and invest...

OBJECTIVE To investigate if early treatment of primary HIV-1 infection (PHI) reduces viral set point and/or increases CD4 lymphocytes. METHODS Analysis of two prospective multi-centre PHI cohorts. HIV-1 RNA and CD4 lymphocytes in patients with transient treatment were compared to those in untreated patients. Time to CD4 lymphocyte decrease below 350/ microl after treatment stop or seroconvers...

BACKGROUND Seroconversion following Hepatitis B virus (HBV) vaccine in hemodialysis (HD) patients has been shown to be suboptimal. Nutritional and immunological factors were shown to influence the seroconversion related to HBV vaccination in HD patients. Resistance to erythropoiesis stimulating agents (ESA) for correction of anemia has also been shown to be associated with nutrition and inflamm...

Guinea pigs were infected with two subtypes of Legionella pneumophila serogroup 1 (UH1 and RH1). Seroconversion by indirect fluorescent-antibody assay was demonstrated in 94 to 97% of guinea pigs when the challenge strain was used as the antigen. The standard Philadelphia 1 antigen demonstrated seroconversion in 94% UH1-challenged animals, but in only 66% of RH1-challenged animals.

Seventy-three chronic hepatitis B patients who had either hepatitis B e antigen (HBeAg) seroconversion (group I) or HBeAg-negative disease (group II) were studied. HBV DNA levels at HBeAg seroconversion (group I) and at initial visits (group II) were significantly lower among patients who were persistently negative for HBeAg than among those who underwent HBeAg reversion.

OBJECTIVES To determine indirectly the effect of changes in levels of reproductive hormones on CD4 lymphocyte counts by investigating the impact of pregnancy and menopause on CD4 lymphocyte counts in HIV-infected women. METHODS Participants were 382 women with a known interval of HIV seroconversion. Review of questionnaires or patient charts provided information on pregnancy and menopause. A ...

Congenital transmission of Toxoplasma gondii occurs mainly when a mother acquires the infection for the first time during pregnancy. It was recently shown that although early treatment of the primary infection during pregnancy has little or no impact on the fetomaternal transmission rate, it does reduce the incidence of sequelae in infected infants. Seroconversion is defined by the appearance o...