Modeling suggests that microliter volumes of contaminated blood caused an outbreak of hepatitis C during computerized tomography.

ABSTRACT:

Background & aims

Acute hepatitis C (AHC) is not frequently identified because patients are usually asymptomatic, although may be recognized after iatrogenic exposures such as needle stick injuries, medical injection, and acupuncture. We describe an outbreak of AHC among 12 patients who received IV saline flush from a single multi-dose vial after intravenous contrast administration for a computerized tomography (CT) scan. The last patient to receive IV contrast with saline flush from a multi-dose vial at the clinic on the previous day was known to have chronic HCV genotype 1b (termed potential source, PS). Here we sought to confirm (via genetic analysis) the source of infection and to predict the minimal contaminating level of IV saline flush needed to transmit infectious virus to

SUBMITTER: Shteyer E 

PROVIDER: S-EPMC6333404 | biostudies-literature | 2019

REPOSITORIES: biostudies-literature