New test uses a drop of blood to reveal entire history of infections

Baku. 6 June. REPORT.AZ/ Researchers have developed a cheap and rapid test that reveals a person’s full history of viral infections from a single drop of blood.

Report informs citing foreign media, the test allows doctors to read out a list of the viruses that have infected, or continue to infect, patients even when they have not caused any obvious symptoms.

The technology means that GPs could screen patients for all of the viruses capable of infecting people. It could transform the detection of serious infections such as hepatitis C and HIV, which people can carry for years without knowing.

“Normally, when a doctor wants to know if someone’s been infected with a virus, they have to guess what the virus is, and then look specifically for that virus,” said Stephen Elledge, who led the project at Brigham and Women’s Hospital in Boston.

“This could lead to a diagnostic where people go annually to their doctor and get their viral history recorded. It could certainly discover viral infections that are serious and that a patient didn’t know they had,” he said.