Re: OT:FIV false positive?

[Del Daniels]

I'm not very up to date on reading the posts lately so may easily have missed something ... but most of us have our FIV+ mixed with our negatives unless the positive is aggressive since it usually takes a deep bite to pass the disease.  FeLV+ is more contagious and not as many are mixed with negatives.  Is there another reason to separate her if she is FIV+?   Del ----- Original Message ----- From: Hideyo Yamamoto To: felvtalk@felineleukemia.org Sent: Thursday, March 24, 2005 11:59 AM Subject: OT:FIV false positive? Buddha (Squeekie)’s blood work came back from a lab – when we did ELISA in house clinic test, she was negative on FeLV/FIV – then, Antech lab did the virus test again on ELISA (by mistake since I did not ask them to do so, but they did it anyway by mistake), but on their ELISA test from the lab, the FIV came back as positive.   I had a similar thing happened to one my other kitties, Rikki – when I first rescued him, the ELISA (both in house test and antech lab) came back as negative, 2 months later, we re-tested him again, and the antech came back as positive on FIV (did not do in house at this time) – but I have always felt (just a feeling) that it was false positive for some reason, but the meantime, he was isolated from others just in case  – and two or three years later (which is sometime last year), I tested him again, and this time, in ELISA, both in house clinic and Antech lab came back as Negative, and ELISA/Western Blot by Cornell came back as negative, but DNA test through another lab came back as Positive – which was very confusing.  And I was supposed to send it again to UC Davis for another DNA test as recommended by Cornell – but never have – so he is still isolated.  Also, he is asymptomatic (no symptoms at all).  Again, I have three other FIV (definite FIV) boys, but they are all healthy, unlike FeLV, many cats don’t necessary die from FIV, but die with FIV – so it’s hard to tell from their heath condition sometimes. But because of the inconsistency, he is still alone, which makes me feel very badly. I should probably do another test and see what happens soon.   Anyway, I guess I have to do the same thing for Buddha (run western blot and another ELISA, and possibly IFA and DNA test – I had to anesthetize her to draw blood last time, and probably have to do so again, which I hate to do, but, I really can’t merge her with other kitties without knowing for sure of the results because of the risks to other cats –anyway, I am writing this to you in case you have any insights on this situation.   Unlike FeLV virus, once you have the FIV virus in the body, the virus tends to stay – so once it’s positive, s/he will always be positive – so inconsistency of the results (from positive to negative) comes from false test result, that’s what I read and heard.   Everyone, regardless, please pray for Buddha that she does not have FIV – I really wanted her to merge with the cats in the main house – which will make it difficult otherwise.  Again, thank you for listening, and I appreciate any advise or input.   Thank you.   Hideyo