Assessment of viral loads as markers of disease status

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In recent years, the overall AIDS and AIDS associated cancer mortality in the U.S. has significantly decreased, but the decrease has not been consistent across all populations. Due to an array of barriers to care, minorities and poor people who are infected with the human immunodeficiency virus type I (HIV) and various other sexually transmitted diseases (i.e., human herpes virus type 8 [HHV-8] and human papillomavirus [HPV]) have not benefited from advances in the treatment of HIV and HIV associated diseases as other groups. Minorities are acquiring HIV (and other sexually transmitted infectious diseases) at much higher rates than observed in Caucasians. African American (AA) women are the fastest growing group of HIV positive individuals. Our proposal addresses this issue by developing a partnership between the researchers, the established health care facilities, community outreach groups and education initiatives to close the gaps in these philosophical differences, realize the limitations, and reach out to the medical community, researcher, as well as the public to reduce the health disparities. It focuses specifically on consolidation of the resources between various groups to maximize health care for the underserved populations in SC. We believe that the outcome of this study will benefit all the underserved groups in the nation The five specific aims of this project are: 1) to establish a molecular virology laboratory to serve as a core research resource for the EXPORT collaborating researchers 2) to collect and provide data on HIV-1 in HIV-1 seropositive individuals recruited for participation in the projects of Drs. Hand and Phillips and Drs. Stoskopf and Geslani, 3) to provide quantitative assessment of HPV 16 and 18 E7 mRNA, sequencing and genotyping of HPV, and HPV viral load from Pap smears collected from the other full research project headed by Drs. Creek and Pirisi, 4) to determine HHV-8 viral loads in HIV-1 seropositive individuals for this research project and then to 5) investigate any correlation(s) between the development of full blown AIDS, and KS.