title: New concepts in diagnostics for infectious diarrhea.
abstract: Conventional approaches to the diagnosis of infectious diarrhea must include several modalities to detect an array of potential viruses, bacteria, and parasites. We will provide a general overview of the wide range of diagnostic modalities available for enteropathogens, briefly discuss some of the limitations of conventional methods, and then focus on new molecular methods, including real-time PCR and next-generation sequencing. In particular, we will discuss quantitation of pathogen load with these techniques. We will then describe examples whereby novel diagnostics may help illuminate the etiology of infectious diarrhea, where they may not, and how they may benefit studies of immunity to enteric infections.
authors.affiliation: Division of Infectious Diseases and International Health University of Virginia Health System, Charlottesville, Virginia, USA.
authors.forename: J A
authors.initials: JA
authors.lastname: Platts-Mills
authors.forename: J
authors.initials: J
authors.lastname: Liu
authors.forename: E R
authors.initials: ER
authors.lastname: Houpt
mesh_terms: D000818:Animals; D018407:Bacterial Physiological Phenomena; D015169:Colony Count, Microbial; D004403:Dysentery / Q000175:diagnosis*; D059014:High-Throughput Nucleotide Sequencing; D006801:Humans; D007239:Infections / Q000175:diagnosis*; D059208:Parasite Load; D010271:Parasites / Q000502:physiology*; D057089:Pathology, Molecular / Q000379:methods* / Q000639:trends; D019562:Viral Load; D018406:Virus Physiological Phenomena