• Paula Renata Lima Machado, Kleber Juvenal Silva Farias, Maira Gabriela Martins Pereira, Patrícia Pereira da Silva de Freitas, and FonsecaBenedito Antônio Lopes daBAMD, PhD. Associate Professor, Virology Research Center, Faculdade de Medicina de Ribeirão Preto (FMRP), Universidade de São Paulo (USP), Ribeirão Preto, São Paulo, Brazil..
• PhD. Biomedical Scientist, Virology Research Center, Faculdade de Medicina de Ribeirão Preto (FMRP), Universidade de São Paulo (USP), Ribeirão Preto, São Paulo, Brazil.
• Sao Paulo Med J. 2015 Apr 14; 134 (3): 187192187-92.

Context And ObjectiveKaposi's sarcoma (KS) is a common neoplastic disease in AIDS patients. The aim of this study was to evaluate the frequency of human herpesvirus 8 (HHV-8) infection in human immunodeficiency virus (HIV)-infected patients, with or without KS manifestations and correlate HHV-8 detection with KS staging.Design And SettingAnalytic cross-sectional study conducted in a public tertiary-level university hospital in Ribeirão Preto, São Paulo, Brazil.MethodsAntibodies against HHV-8 lytic-phase antigens were detected by means of the immunofluorescence assay. HHV-8 DNA was detected in the patient samples through a nested polymerase chain reaction (nested PCR) that amplified a region of open reading frame (ORF)-26 of HHV-8.ResultsAnti-HHV-8 antibodies were detected in 30% of non-KS patients and 100% of patients with KS. Furthermore, the HHV-8 DNA detection rates observed in HIV-positive patients with KS were 42.8% in serum, 95.4% in blood samples and 100% in skin biopsies; and in patients without KS, the detection rate was 4% in serum. Out of the 16 serum samples from patients with KS-AIDS who were classified as stage II, two were positive (12.5%); and out of the 33 samples from patients in stage IV, 19 (57.6%) were positive.ConclusionWe observed an association between HHV-8 detection and disease staging, which was higher in the serum of patients in stage IV. This suggests that detection of HHV-8 DNA in serum could be very useful for clinical assessment of patients with KS and for monitoring disease progression.

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