Isolation of hepatitis C virus RNA from serum for reverse transcription-PCR

Standard multistep extraction and isolation of RNA for hepatitis C virus (HCV) reverse transcription (RT)-PCR are impractical for routine use in clinical laboratories. We compared three simple commercially available methods for RNA isolation (RNAzol B, TRISOLV, and ULTRASPEC; Biotecx Laboratories, Houston, Tex.) and a total nucleic acid isolation method (IsoQuick; MicroProbe Corp., Garden Grove, Calif.) for the recovery of HCV RNA from sera obtained from 12 viremic patients for RT-PCR. RNAzol B, TRISOLV, ULTRASPEC, and IsoQuick extraction methods detected 87.5, 79.2, 33.3, and 58.3% of the paired positive samples, respectively. The method used for isolation of RNA is an important concern when optimizing HCV RT-PCR.