Prevalence of thrombocytopaenia in Human Immunodeficiency Virus-1 infection in Zaria

Abstract

Background: Thrombocytopaenia is relatively common during the course of HIVinfection and it may serve as the first evidence of  infection. It has been associated with clinical or immunological severity of the disease. Multiple interacting factors may contribute to this haematological manifestation of HIVinfection.

Aim: To determine the prevalence of thrombocytopaenia and its relationship to CD4+ T  lymphocyte count in antiretroviral naïve HIV-1 infected patients.

Methodology: Four hundred consecutive HIV-1 infected patients undergoing pre treatment investigations for staging were recruited over a one year period, at the HIV subspecialty clinic of Ahmadu Bello University Teaching Hospital, Zaria. All the patients were confirmed HIV-1 infected, repeatedly reactive by ELISA. Platelet count was determined by standard manual method and CD4+ T cell enumeration by Dynal® (Oslo Norway) manual method.

Results: Of the 400  patients studied, the prevalence of thrombocytopaenia was 6.25% with a male to female ratio of 1:1.7. There is a significant positive  correlation between platelet count and CD4 + T lymphocyte count r 0.086, P 0.043 (p < 0.05), however this association is weak by  clinical/immunological staging.

Conclusion: Thrombocytopaenia is not an uncommon finding in HIV infected patients in our setting and  often occurs in the severely immunocompromised individual. Platelet count cannot be used as a substitute to determine the severity of  immunosuppression.