OBJECTIVES To investigate the relative effectiveness of different HIV testing and counselling (HTC) services in improving HIV diagnosis rates and increasing HTC coverage in African settings. METHODS Patient records from three HTC services [community outreach HTC during cohort study rounds (CO-HTC), walk-in HTC at the local health centre (WI-HTC) and antenatal HIV testing (ANC-HTC)] were linke...

BACKGROUND The success of HIV programs relies on widely accessible HIV testing and counseling (HTC) services at health facilities as well as in the community. Home-based HTC (HB-HTC) is a popular community-based approach to reach persons who do not test at health facilities. Data comparing HB-HTC to other community-based HTC approaches are very limited. This trial compares HB-HTC to mobile clin...

We examined the effect of insulin treatment on HTC cells transfected with large numbers of either normal insulin receptors (HTC-IR) or insulin receptors defective in tyrosine kinase (HTC-IR/M-1030). In both HTC-IR and HTC-IR/M-1030 cells, 20 h of insulin treatment (1 microM) at 37 degrees C resulted in a 65% decrease in the number of binding sites with a reciprocal 6-fold increase in affinity. ...

Hydrothermal carbonization (HTC) is a promising technology used for bioenergy conversion from bio-wastes such as sewage sludge, livestock manure, and food waste. To determine the optimum HTC reaction temperature in maximizing the gross energy recovery efficiency of poultry slaughterhouse sludge cake, a pilot-scale HTC reactor was designed and operated under reaction temperatures of 170, 180, 19...

HIV testing and counselling (HTC) is a gateway to all systems of AIDS-related care. This study examined national programme data to highlight gaps in HTC service utilization, regional differences and differential use of various HTC programs in Ghana in the period, 2007-2010. Analysis showed HTC increased rapidly across the country, however the increase was not uniform across the 10 regions. Also...

Lignocellulosic biomass is one of the most abundant yet underutilized renewable energy resources. Both anaerobic digestion (AD) and hydrothermal carbonization (HTC) are promising technologies for bioenergy production from biomass in terms of biogas and HTC biochar, respectively. In this study, the combination of AD and HTC is proposed to increase overall bioenergy production. Wheat straw was an...

OBJECTIVE Hypertension and hypercholesterolemia might interfere with renal repair mechanisms. We hypothesized that simvastatin improves the survival of endothelial progenitor cells (EPC) in the renal microenvironment imposed by concurrent renovascular hypertension and dietary hypercholesterolemia (HTC). METHODS AND RESULTS Pigs were studied after 12 weeks of no intervention (n=6), HTC (n=6), ...

BACKGROUND Methadone maintenance treatment (MMT) reduces HIV risk behaviors and improves access to HIV-related services among drug users. In this study, we assessed the uptake and willingness of MMT patients to refer HIV testing and counseling (HTC) service to their sexual partners and relatives. METHODS Health status, HIV-related risk behaviors, and HTC uptake and referrals of 1,016 MMT pati...

BACKGROUND Effective national and global HIV responses require a significant expansion of HIV testing and counselling (HTC) to expand access to prevention and care. Facility-based HTC, while essential, is unlikely to meet national and global targets on its own. This article systematically reviews the evidence for community-based HTC. METHODS AND FINDINGS PubMed was searched on 4 March 2013, c...

BACKGROUND AND OBJECTIVES Integrating acute HIV-infection (AHI) testing into clinical settings is critical to prevent transmission, and realize potential treatment-as-prevention benefits. We evaluated acceptability of AHI testing and compared AHI prevalence at sexually transmitted infection (STI) clinics and HIV testing and counseling (HTC) clinics in Lilongwe, Malawi. METHODS We conducted HI...