An adolescent with fever, headache, and myalgias

Depicts results of rapid HIV antibody screening and Western blot assays for four dates over time that specimens were collected and tested. (A) Negative results were obtained for the initial specimen tested using a rapid HIV-1/2 immunoassay. The rapid test remained negative on the second sample collected a week later and became more reactive with time as subsequent samples were tested. (B) HIV-1 Western blots performed on the patient's first two samples were negative, while later specimens were shown to be indeterminate, with the appearance of weakly reactive gp160 and p24 bands in the third specimen and reactive p65, p51 and p24 bands and weakly reactive gp160 and p17 bands in the fourth sample submitted for testing. Abbreviations: S, sample; NR, nonreactive; R+, weakly reactive; R++, moderately reactive; NRC, nonreactive control; LPC, low positive control; HPC, high positive control; gp, glycoprotein; p, protein.