The Department of Universal Health has appointed the General Hospital of Valencia as a reference center for receiving samples from suspected cases of monkey pox (Monkeypox) and for performing PCR for the early diagnosis of this infectious disease.

The Generalitat has adapted the protocol prepared by the Ministry and has centralized this activity in two hospitals: the General Hospital of Valencia, which will receive and process the samples from the departments of Castellón and Valencia, and the Dr. Balmis Hospital, which will do the same with the samples of the departments of the province of Alicante.

Both centers are reference centers for imported diseases and international health, so they have specific infrastructures in their Microbiology laboratories to carry out this work.

Thus, in the event of a clinical suspicion of the monkeypox virus, the health departments will send the patient's sample, duly preserved, to these two hospitals, where the determination will be carried out and the results will be reported.

The main sample is fluid from the gallbladder or the scab of skin lesions, although it can also be obtained through nasopharyngeal exudate, plasma or urine. It is a PCR, the same diagnostic test used for Covid-19, but requires different reagents for processing.

In this regard, the head of the Microbiology service of the General Hospital, Concepción Gimeno, has pointed out that in the current context it is "necessary to have an appropriate methodology and experienced specialist personnel to deal with the rapid diagnosis of outbreaks and even epidemics due to emerging microorganisms" .

The decision to decentralize the technique, which until now was carried out at the National Center for Microbiology, located in Majadahonda (Madrid), deepens the early diagnosis of cases, since "considerably shortens the times for obtaining results, going from several days to just a few hours”, according to the same sources.

Therefore, it allows rapid diagnosis in a patient with clinical suspicion of this infection, for its proper clinical management and maintenance of isolation measures, which prevent the spread of the infection.

At this time, a suspected case is one that presents a compatible clinical picture, which includes the appearance of fever, vesicular lesions in any location on the skin and adenopathies (increased size of the nodes).

However, both the appearance of fever and vesicles could be confused with other diseases such as herpes, chickenpox or syphilis, among others, clinical pictures that, unlike monkeypox, are much more frequent, so it is essential have this microbiological technique to be able to carry out the differential diagnosis of this entity.