Performance of the biomerieux DBS puncher and dried blood spots to measure HIV-1 viral load by real-time nuclisenseasyq HIV-1 assay

Introduction: The latest World Health Organization recommendations request viral load (VL) testing, if possible, for monitoring HIV-1 infections. However, the use of plasma is an obstacle to realize this test in sub-Saharan Africa. In this context, the dried blood spot (DBS) is an interesting tool for sample collections. The objective of this study was to assess the performance of, the bioMérieux PUNCHER a new toolfor cutting DBS.Methods: Plasma and DBS samples were obtained from 102 patients, with17 HIV-1 negative patients and 85 HIV-1 infected patients (58% were antiretroviral therapy naïve). DBS were stored at room temperature for 15 days before testing. The PUNCHER’s performance used to cut DBS was evaluated with following criteria: contamination, time of cut and VL measurement. VL was measured in parallel on plasma and DBS samples using NucliSENS EasyQ HIV-1.Results: No contamination was observed with negative samples. Sixty two DBS were cut in one hour. The correlation between plasma and DBS results was strong (R = 0.91; P< 0.001). According to Bland-Altman approach the mean of differences was [-0.59 ± 0.65] log10 copies/ml.Conclusions: PUNCHER is highly efficient at cutting DBS, and the VL results from DBS correlated well with those obtained from plasma. bioMérieux puncher can be used to cut DBS for HIV-1 diagnosis and virological monitoring.Keywords: DBS, bioMérieux puntcher, performance, Viral loa