Adenovirus is an important cause of morbidity and mortality in the transplant setting, causing pneumonia, hemorrhagic cystitis, hepatitis, encephalitis, pancreatitis, enteritis, and disseminated disease with the mortality rate reaching 60% in some especially high risk situations such as pediatric hematopoietic stem cell transplantation. Since proper management is dependent upon early diagnosis, quantitative adenovirus DNA PCR is useful for detecting the virus, tracking the course of infection, and monitoring response to treatment.

Treatment of adenovirus in immunocompromised patients presents challenges, including drug toxicity, delayed onset of disease after discontinuing therapy, and emergence of mutations that may affect the ability of diagnostic assays to detect them efficiently.

Lavender (EDTA), 4mL

1. Spin
2. Transfer plasma to a Screw-cap polypropylene frozen transport vial/tube - 4mL (LabCorp)
3. Freeze

To avoid delays in turnaround time when requesting multiple tests on frozen samples, submit a separate frozen aliquot for each test requested.

Screw-cap polypropylene frozen transport vial/tube - 4mL (LabCorp)

Yellow ACD

Frozen (preferred) - 30 days

Refrigerated - 14 days

Ambient - 96 hours

• Wood-shafted swab
• Calcium alginate swab
• Specimens received in trap containers
• Specimens beyond their acceptable length of time from collection as listed in the specimen handling
• Specimen types other than those listed
• PCR testing cannot be added on to a sample that has been opened and/or used for other testing. If the sample has already been used for testing, a new specimen will need to be collected.

Real-time polymerase chain reaction (RT-PCR)

Negative