Offering HIV testing in an acute medical admissions unit in Newcastle upon Tyne.

摘要

Editor - Ellis and colleagues' study provokes much thought with regard to acute admissions units and their role in asymptomatic disease diagnosis (Clin Med December 2011 pp 541-43). The concept of screening all patients for treatable diseases is attractive but may generate more dilemmas than solutions. The difficulty comes in choosing the diseases to screen. In the United Kingdom human immunodeficiency virus (HIV) has a prevalence of 0.15% (86,500/61,400,000). This is less common than other blood born viruses, in particular hepatitis B 0.3%2 and hepatitis C 0.4%.3 Can we routinely test them all, and if so, is an acute admissions unit really the best place for screening?