How HIV Can be Detected

By looking at a person's face you can not tell whether he or she is infected with HIV. The infected person looks perfectly healthy and feels well for years. The infection can only be detected by doing a blood test i.e. ELISA HIV antibody test. If someone is found to be positive by ELISA and confirmed by the second test (done on a different blood sample using a different method) the person is said to be seropositive..

SPOT TEST:

• This is a simple rapid test which can be used to find out whether a person is HIV positive or not. The result will be given to the patient within half an hour. Occasionally, there are chances of a false positive report and hence a positive report should always be confirmed by doing ELISA test.

WESTERN BLOT (WB) TEST:

• It is a specialized and a costly confirmatory test for HIV. It is done only to confirm a positive ELISA or SPOT test report. Ever since the standard of ELISA and SPOT tests has improved, the role of this test seems to be very little in the diagnosis of HIV infection.

CD4 AND VIRAL LOAD TESTING:

• These are very costly tests and it is done only on patients who can afford them and are willing to start anti-HIV (antiretroviral) drugs. It is mandatory to do pre-test and post-test counselling to all the patients before and after the test respectively.