title: TREAT Asia Quality Assessment Scheme (TAQAS) to standardize the outcome of HIV genotypic resistance testing in a group of Asian laboratories.
abstract: The TREAT Asia (Therapeutics, Research, Education, and AIDS Training in Asia) Network is building capacity for Human Immunodeficiency Virus Type-1 (HIV-1) drug resistance testing in the region. The objective of the TREAT Asia Quality Assessment Scheme - designated TAQAS - is to standardize HIV-1 genotypic resistance testing (HIV genotyping) among laboratories to permit rigorous comparison of results from different clinics and testing centres. TAQAS has evaluated three panels of HIV-1-positive plasma from clinical material or low-passage, culture supernatant for up to 10 Asian laboratories. Laboratory participants used their standard protocols to perform HIV genotyping. Assessment was in comparison to a target genotype derived from all participants and the reference laboratory's result. Agreement between most participants at the edited nucleotide sequence level was high (>98%). Most participants performed to the reference laboratory standard in detection of drug resistance mutations (DRMs). However, there was variation in the detection of nucleotide mixtures (0-83%) and a significant correlation with the detection of DRMs (p<0.01). Interpretation of antiretroviral resistance showed approximately 70% agreement among participants when different interpretation systems were used but >90% agreement with a common interpretation system, within the Stanford University Drug Resistance Database. Using the principles of external quality assessment and a reference laboratory, TAQAS has demonstrated high quality HIV genotyping results from Asian laboratories.
authors.affiliation: National Serology Reference Laboratory, Australia. sally@nrl.gov.au
authors.forename: Sally
authors.initials: S
authors.lastname: Land
authors.forename: Philip
authors.initials: P
authors.lastname: Cunningham
authors.forename: Jialun
authors.initials: J
authors.lastname: Zhou
authors.forename: Kevin
authors.initials: K
authors.lastname: Frost
authors.forename: David
authors.initials: D
authors.lastname: Katzenstein
authors.forename: Rami
authors.initials: R
authors.lastname: Kantor
authors.forename: Yi-Ming Arthur
authors.initials: YM
authors.lastname: Chen
authors.forename: Shinichi
authors.initials: S
authors.lastname: Oka
authors.forename: Allison
authors.initials: A
authors.lastname: DeLong
authors.forename: David
authors.initials: D
authors.lastname: Sayer
authors.forename: Jeffery
authors.initials: J
authors.lastname: Smith
authors.forename: Elizabeth M
authors.initials: EM
authors.lastname: Dax
authors.forename: Matthew
authors.initials: M
authors.lastname: Law
mesh_terms: D001208:Asia; D024882:Drug Resistance, Viral; D015497:HIV-1 / Q000187:drug effects / Q000235:genetics*; D006801:Humans; D007753:Laboratories / Q000592:standards*; D008826:Microbial Sensitivity Tests / Q000379:methods / Q000592:standards*; D011785:Quality Assurance, Health Care