What are the different types of viral load tests?

What are the different types of viral load tests?

Charles Farthing (Chief of Medicine, AIDS Healthcare Foundation) gives expert video advice on: Why do I need to take lab tests if I have HIV? and more...

There are a number of different what we call “assays”--different ways of testing the HIV viral load. There is the “PCR” viral load test, which counts the number of copies of the virus, but there's also what they call the “BDNA” viral load test. The viral load tests measure the same thing. They measure the number of viral RNA molecules in the bloodstream, but they do it in slightly different ways.