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Stephen Raffanti, MD; Anders Svenningsson, MD; Lionel Resnick, MD
Mount Sinai Medical Center Miami, Fla

JAMA. 1990;264(19):2501.

	Since this article does not have an abstract, we have provided the first 150 words of the full text PDF and any section headings.

To the Editor.—

As the number of individuals infected with human immunodeficiency virus type 1 (HIV-1) grows, the potential for accidental needle-stick injuries with contaminated blood increases. Strict adherence to infectioncontrol guidelines may limit this hazard. However, needle-stick injuries by discarded sharps present a special problem if the patient source of the needle is unknown.

Report of a Case.—

A nurse in an outpatient medical office had an accidental needle-stick exposure with a discarded angiocatheter. Many catheterization procedures had been performed, and the patient source was unknown. On the day of the accident, the angiocatheter was submitted to our laboratory and approximately 60 µL of serum was aspirated from the clotted blood in the hub of the needle. The sample was reactive to HIV-1 by Western immunoblot.¹ The needle was flushed with 300 µL of phosphate-buffered saline, and the eluant was processed for DNA extraction and polymerase . . . [Full Text PDF of this Article]

Footnotes
Edited by Drummond Rennie, MD, Deputy Editor (West), and Don Riesenberg, MD, Senior Editor.

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