2023 · International journal of pediatric otorhinolaryngology · paywalled
Factors associated with congenital cytomegalovirus infection detected by dried blood spot testing in children with hearing loss
Liao et al.
The finding, in our words
The study found that congenital cytomegalovirus infection is significantly associated with asymmetric bilateral and profound sensorineural hearing loss in children, based on retrospective analysis of dried blood spot testing. This supports the use of decentralised microsampling for early identification of at-risk children, enabling timely intervention.
A paraphrase to the Library’s standard, never the abstract. The source is one link away and is always the authority.
This review establishes that microsampling across blood, saliva, urine and stool matrices offers validated workflows and regulatory recognition for human biomonitoring comparable to conventional methods. It finds that these decentralised approaches enhance participant acceptability and enable screening in remote or low-resource settings.
Among 1242 asymptomatic children in a remote Congolese district, dried blood spot sampling identified 53% as Plasmodium falciparum-positive. No validated artemisinin-resistance mutations were found, but a lumefantrine-susceptibility marker was present in 15% of samples, demonstrating that community-based microsampling can generate actionable resistance surveillance data to guide decentralised malaria treatment strategies.
The study found low SARS-CoV-2 seropositivity in unvaccinated children and young adults in British Columbia, with higher rates in South Asian participants and young infants. Many infections were undetected, highlighting the value of patient-centric microsampling for more accurate, decentralised surveillance.
In British Columbia, finger-prick dried blood spots had 97% specificity and 79% sensitivity for SARS-CoV-2 antibodies in unvaccinated groups, rising to 97 to 100% after vaccination, against serum; limited to one jurisdiction, the results support decentralised serosurveillance with self-collected dried blood spots.
In a Senegalese validation study of 192 infant samples, the Xpert HIV-1 Qual and m-PIMA HIV 1/2 Detect point-of-care assays showed 100% sensitivity and specificity for HIV-1 detection with both dried blood spots and whole blood, achieving perfect agreement with reference laboratory methods. This supports decentralised early infant diagnosis in resource-limited settings, reducing turnaround time and improving linkage to care.