$1 chip tests for HIV and/or Syphilis in 15 minutes flat, fits in your wallet
Getting tested for STDs used to mean a doctor’s visit, vials of blood, and days, weeks, or even months of anxiously waiting for results.
mChip aims to change all that, while simultaneously ridding your brain of viable excuses not to get tested. It works as such: one drop of blood goes on the microfluidics-based optical chip, 15 minutes pass, and boom, the AmEx-sized device will confirm whether or not you have syphilis and / or HIV.
The bantam gizmo is practically foolproof, as reading the results doesn’t require any human interpretation whatsoever. Plus, it’s cheap — cheaper than a coffee at Starbucks. One dollar cheap.
Researchers at Columbia University claim the mChip has a 100 percent detection rate, although there’s a four to six percent chance of getting a false positive — a stat similar to traditional lab tests. As you’d likely expect, there’s hope that the inexpensive mChip will help testing efforts in places like Africa to detect HIV before it turns into AIDS. Next stop: the self-service pharmacy at CVS?
There are far better ways to test in this industry than we are currently using, I like the idea of testing prior to every shoot, tests like this and oraquick make that possible and affordable. Some half ass database probably isn’t the answer. Yes I know it has to have FDA approval for over the cunter sales yada yada BUT a licensed clinic can buy them and distribute them to trained personal in the interim. Eeery company sends someone to be trained for a day or two.
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I personally think something like this is the possible answer to the problem the adult industry has right now. I hope this test is at least as good as the PCR-DNA test used currently and that assuming that it becomes available to the adult industry. Of course if it is only as good as the Elisa/Western Blot which has a three month lead time it is useless for this purpose. I am cautiously optimistic and hope this test creates a revolution in both the adult and testing industries.
I bet any money that there’s some inherent flaw in this thing that has absolutely nothing to do with the fact that it’s not sponsored by, or affiliated with the FSC.
Part of the problem mharris is that old nonsense about the window period. The current window period for the ELISA test is the same as that of the PCRDNA, the thing was AIM made A LOT more money on the PCR DNA tests.
The ELISA is the gold standard test, the biggest problem with the PCRDNA test is that anyone who is HIV positive and has been on anti viral/ protease inhibitor drugs CAN test negative on those tests and usually WILL.
I honestly was not aware that the Elisa/Western Blot was improved to that point. I knew it was the test used for the general public but when I was tested by that method (before PCR-DNA existed) I was told to come back in three months for a second test due to the window period. I know that the PCR-DNA can be a false negative if someone is on the proper HIV drugs but thought that there was the same problem with the Elisa/Western Blot tests as well. Assuming the industry is impressed enough with improved testing methods to accept the E/WB tests that would reduce the cost of testing as some government health departments offer the test for free because it is so cheap to process.
There is NO gold standard HIV test. They all require further “confirmatory” tests; just read the labels. No single test, including what Mike proposes here, is definitive.
In fact, if anything the momentum is now growing for the FDA-approved PCR-RNA test, not back to Elisa.
Aside from the fact that the “Gold Standard” discussion is pure hyperbole, the window period discussion is also quite misleading. Different HIV tests are designed for different purposes: some diagnostic, some confirmatory. But again, there is no conclusive single test (or series of tests). It all depends upon the rather arbitrary standards set by the region in which you are testing and the test manufacturer’s guidelines. You could test in America and be HIV-, and test in Germany but be HIV+. Your counts could shift, and suddenly, by arbitrary definition, you could no longer measure HIV+. Cross the border into another country, and you might still be HIV+.
The ELISA test is not a definitive diagnostic tool. The ELISA antibody tests were developed to provide a high level of confidence that donated blood was not infected with HIV (a negative result). One cannot conclude that blood which yields a POSITIVE result from an ELISA antibody test is in fact infected with HIV. Sometimes, re-testing the donor in several months will produce a negative ELISA antibody test. This is why a confirmatory test (in the US, usually a Western Blot) is ALWAYS used before reporting a “positive” HIV test result.
According to the FDA, the average window period with HIV-1 (as opposed to HIV-2) antibody tests can be as short as 25 days under certain circumstances. Antigen testing can reduce the window period to approximately 16 days — but only under certain circumstances.
Nucleic Acid Testing (NAT) may reduce this period to approximately 12 days. However, since these tests are expensive, the blood is screened by first pooling some 8-24 samples and testing these together; only if the pool tests positive is each sample re-tested individually. It is my understanding that this is the test which is FDA-approved, and commonly performed, for blood and organ donation. I do not know if it is approved for the kind of testing that the adult industry would require. Another version of this test is intended for use in conjunction with clinical presentation and other laboratory markers of DISEASE PROGRESS for the management of HIV-1-infected patients.
Nucleic Acid Amplification Testing is generally used as a CONFIRMATORY test, to help resolve an initial indeterminate Western blot, for example.
The CA p24 antigen test (which detects the presence of the p24 protein) is also not considered useful for general diagnostics, as it has very low sensitivity and only works during a certain time period after infection before the body produces antibodies to the p24 protein. This test is no longer used routinely here in the US, and would often be useless in the context of the adult industry, for example, to screen out infected persons seeking to enter the talent pool.
Here’s some info from CDC of “Rapid Testing”: http://www.cdc.gov/hiv/topics/testing/resources/factsheets/rt-lab.htm
Note, the CDC writes: “A nonreactive result from a single test is considered negative. However, if the person whose test result is negative may have been exposed to HIV within the past 3 months, it may be too early for the test to detect HIV antibodies. A repeat test at a later time is recommended.”
That would imply that rapid tests may be utterly useless for a highly sexually active community such as adult performers.
The CDC continues: “A reactive result from a rapid test is considered a preliminary positive result. The test does not have to be repeated before the result is reported as “preliminary positive.” It must be followed up with another type of test a Western blot, an immunofluorescence assay, or an RNA test to confirm the result.”
Furthermore, the CDC notes: “Specimens from HIV-infected persons receiving highly active antiretroviral therapy may produce false-negative results on rapid tests.”
In other words, Rapid Tests are NOT even close to being a “Gold Standard.”
In a nutshell, Mike is correct that PCR-DNA was not the “Gold Standard”, but neither is anything else — especially not Rapid Tests. However, some tests remain more useful as diagnostic tools than others.
And P.S. — The preferred nomenclature these days is STIs not STDs.
See thats what happens when you have lawyers and career political types doing testing instead of medical professionals.
The CDC makes it VERY clear that the ELICA with confirmatory Western Blot IS THE GOLD Standard test for HIV.
They also make it very clear that the PCR/DNA test IS a diagnostic test to measure the viral load of someone KNOWN to have a viral infection (the technology can measure viral loads of viruses other than HIV as well)
The So called window period in modern ELISA tests is the same as a PCR DNA Test
This stuff has all been detailed here ad nauseum
Put this in the hands of medical PROFESSIONALS and lets do BETTER
I for one trust a series of negative oral swab tests prior to every shoot far more than I would trust a Pcrdna test a person who has shot 20 times in 2 months and tested negative every time is a far lower risk in my eyes than a guy who tested 20 days ago
And the truth is I KNOW its VERY difficult for female to male transmission to even occur I personally think HIV is among the least of our real worries.
the word lies gets thrown around a lot but look at the FSC they have done NOTHING BUT lie for years, they even lied about taking down pwl. Why in Gods name would anyone believe anything they say?
ELISA with a confirmatory Western blot cannot be the Gold Standard test — it is two tests, a series of tests. At most it would be the Gold standard for *confirming* an HIV diagnosis, not for the determination of whether a patient is negative or positive.
Setting the scientific debate aside for the moment, Mike, how would the adult industry follow or enforce protocols in the event of an “incident”, in the absence of a consistent, verifiable, universally-followed system? What protocols? How would an industry-wide work stoppage, or even a quarantine list, work?
If there was on-set swabbing, or the like, and no database was maintained, what would/could be done then?
Are you proposing that your system is fool-proof? Because, it seems to me, that’s the only way it would work.