We are glad to begin to welcome some academic institutions to the WHCC Affordable Health Innovations Exhibit and Awards Program. Sujit Jangam, a graduate student at Northwestern University’s Center for Innovations in Global Health Technologies, will present on a program they are developing that allows for point-of-care HIV testing for infants.
Efficient and affordable HIV testing is problematic in resource-limited settings. Blood samples collected from infants in rural sites must be transported to urban laboratories for HIV testing. This can cost up to $50 per test, require 4-5 hours of processing time though complex equipment and trained personnel.
Jangam is working on different approach that uses Fast Isolation of Nucleic Acid (FINA) technology that makes results available in the same visit, can be performed at collection sites with minimal infrastructure and is less expenseive.
We’re excited to welcome Mr. Jangam to the program!
March 9, 2010 at 8:34 am |
This sounds great! I am an advocate finding families for HIV+ orphans. Many adoptive families are now considering children with HIV. Many more adoptive families could be found for babies under 18 months. Some of the country programs are using PCR testing now (such as Ethiopia), but some other countries (such as Ukraine) are still using antibody tests on babies due to the constraints you mention above. I would like to know more about this test when it becomes available. Do you know how long it might be? Thank you so much.