Universal test and treat and the HIV epidemic in rural South Africa: a phase 4, open-label, community cluster randomised trial
Iwuji et al.
The finding, in our words
The trial found that universal test and treat delivered through home-based dried blood spot HIV testing did not lower population HIV incidence compared with standard care (2.11 versus 2.27 per 100 person-years). This suggests that decentralised screening alone is insufficient to reduce transmission without innovations that improve linkage to care.
A paraphrase to the Library’s standard, never the abstract. The source is one link away and is always the authority.
In a pilot mixed-methods study of youth with HIV, mailed HemaSpot-HF kits enabled home-based dried blood spot collection that participants found feasible and acceptable, supporting remote viral load monitoring and a self-management model for decentralised care.
Gurung et al., AIDS and behavior (paywalled) · source ↗
This narrative review surveys remote biospecimen collection products for sexual health research, including dried blood spots and volumetric absorptive microsampling, and concludes that successful implementation needs a multidisciplinary, participant-centred team with sufficient time allocated to the complexities of collection procedures and processes.
Horvath et al., AIDS and behavior (paywalled) · source ↗
This pilot study found that while initial household enrolment was low at 9%, remote follow-up was highly feasible, with 88% of respondents, 151 of 172, successfully returning self-collected capillary blood samples after 12 months. This shows that decentralised microsampling is viable for household cohorts when face-to-face contact is restricted.
A study of older rural US patients found that 96 to 98 per cent of self-collected dried blood spot specimens were successfully analysed for HIV viral load, with high acceptability. However, concordance between self-reported and measured viral load was only 69 to 82 per cent, highlighting the value of objective decentralised microsampling over self-reporting.
Walsh et al., AIDS and behavior (paywalled) · source ↗
A 2025 review maps 28 microsampling devices, from dried spots and volumetric absorptive tips to upper-arm liquid capillary collectors, and names what a laboratory must control before their results are used: the haematocrit effect in non-volumetric dried samples, interstitial fluid from finger milking, volume, haemolysis and transport stability. Regulators on both sides of the Atlantic ask for the same two things, a device the patient can use safely and a sample fit for the test.