TITLE:
Role of HIV-1 Viral Load in Initiating Antiretroviral Therapy
AUTHORS:
Nayana A. Ingole, Seema M. Kukreja, Preeti R. Mehta
KEYWORDS:
Viral Load, CD4 Counts, HIV, Monitoring, ART, Clinically Asymptomatic
JOURNAL NAME:
World Journal of AIDS,
Vol.1 No.4,
December
5,
2011
ABSTRACT: Purpose: For commencement of Antiretroviral Therapy (ART), CD4 count and/or WHO clinical staging is used as the guide in India. In western countries along with clinical and immunological criteria, HIV-1 viral load is also used to start the patient on treatment. The present study was conducted to determine the role of viral load in taking decision on ART commencement in HIV-1 infected treatment naïve individuals. Method: A cross sectional study was carried out at the Integrated Counseling and Testing Centre (ICTC) in the Department of Microbiology at a Tertiary care teaching hospital after Institutional Ethics Committee approval. After obtaining written informed consent, HIV-1 infected patients who were clinically asymptomatic, ART naïve, having CD4 count ® TaqMan® HIV-1 Test. Result: During the study period of one year, 8966 HIV-1 infected patients were referred for CD4 count estimation. Of these 1624 patients had CD4 count