Endogenous carbon monoxide due to hemolytic anemia: A forensic red herring.

Carbon monoxide (CO) toxicity associated with exposure to an environmental, exogenous source, is routinely investigated in the field of forensics. Paramedics responded to the home of a 60-year-old woman who complained of persistent nausea, dizziness, and fatigue. Her initial carboxyhemoglobin (COHb) saturation was 25% as measured by paramedics in the field via pulse CO-oximetry (SpCO) and was, 2 hours later, confirmed by hospital laboratory spectrophotometric analysis to be 16% after initial treatment in the emergency department.

Elevated virus loads of Kaposi's sarcoma-associated human herpesvirus 8 predict Kaposi's sarcoma disease progression, but elevated levels of human immunodeficiency virus type 1 do not.

Kaposi's sarcoma-associated herpesvirus (KSHV) is found in Kaposi's sarcoma (KS), multicentric Castleman's disease, and primary effusion lymphomas. To prospectively evaluate KSHV load as a biomarker for KS clinical status and prognosis in a cohort of men with AIDS-related KS, 2 quantitative polymerase chain reaction (PCR) assays were developed and tested to determine KSHV peripheral blood mononuclear cell (PBMC) virus loads. Most patients (13/15) with good-prognosis KS had < or =1.