Molecular epidemiology and characterization of enteroviruses detected in cerebrospinal fluid and respiratory samples in Slovenia, 2014-2023.

Enterovirus (EV) infections have various symptoms and severe complications, including death. To determine EV prevalence and EV types in Slovenia, data on over 25 000 EV RNA tests for diagnostics and surveillance from 2014 to 2023 were analyzed. Altogether, 3733 cerebrospinal fluid (CSF) and 21 297 respiratory (sentinel and clinical) samples were tested for EV RNA.

Comparing COVID-19 severity in patients hospitalized for community-associated Delta, BA.1 and BA.4/5 variant infection.

Background: Despite decreasing COVID-19 disease severity during the Omicron waves, a proportion of patients still require hospitalization and intensive care.

Objective: To compare demographic characteristics, comorbidities, vaccination status, and previous infections in patients hospitalized for community-associated COVID-19 (CAC) in predominantly Delta, Omicron BA.1 and BA.

HIV-1 subtype diversity and phylogenetic insight into non-B subtype transmission in Slovenia, 1989-2013.

Introduction: Disease progression, drug resistance mutations, and treatment strategies may vary by HIV-1 subtype. This study determined HIV-1 subtypes circulating in Slovenia, a Central European country with an HIV-1 epidemic driven by men who have sex with men, focusing on molecular epidemiology of non-B subtypes.

Methods: A total of 367 HIV-1 sequences were included.

Sporadic Hepatitis A Virus PCR False-Positive Results Observed during Reflex Testing of Serum Samples Previously Tested for Anti-HAV Antibodies and Caused by Contamination with HAV RNA Present in the Reagents of the Commercial Anti-HAV Immunoassay.

Hepatitis A diagnosis relies on serology and occasionally on hepatitis A virus (HAV) RNA detection. For timely diagnosis and the avoidance of drawing additional blood, molecular testing is often performed as reflex testing by using blood specimens that were initially sent for anti-HAV serology. Reflex molecular testing is preferably performed from different sample aliquots, but, for limited sample quantities, it uses samples that have been preprocessed in an immunoassay analyzer.