Philip A. Pizzo, M.D.
Publication Details
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Quantitative analysis of viral burden in tissues from adults and children with symptomatic human immunodeficiency virus type 1 infection assessed by polymerase chain reaction.
J Infect Dis. 1994; (2): 325-33
The amount of human immunodeficiency virus type 1 (HIV-1) in various tissues was investigated by polymerase chain reaction (PCR) in 16 patients with end-stage HIV-1 infection and 7 patients with symptomatic but less advanced disease. During postmortem study of the 16 end-stage patients, HIV-1 DNA was found most often in lymph nodes and the spleen (both 100%), lung (93.8%), and colon (87.5%). Biopsied lymph nodes from the 7 symptomatic patients contained substantially higher copy numbers of HIV-1 RNA and DNA than did peripheral blood mononuclear cells (PBMC). Plasma viral RNA levels correlated significantly with the amount of HIV-1 RNA in PBMC (r2 = .86, P = .0025) but not with the level of viral RNA in lymph nodes in patients with symptomatic HIV-1 infection. These data suggest that although lymph nodes represent the main site for HIV-1 infection and replication, the level of circulating viral burden may not be solely determined by the magnitude of active HIV-1 replication in lymph nodes.
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