Immune-virological status in people with HIV from naïve to six months on cART at Ahmadu Bello University Teaching Hospital Zaria, Nigeria.

Abstract

The implementation of Combine Antiretroviral Therapy (cART) to treat HIV infection has been an incredible success and has saved millions of lives by improved clinical outcomes. Antiretroviral treatment reduces viremia to undetectable levels in people living with HIV (PLWH) by suppressing viral replication and allowing immune reconstitution. However, ongoing background inflammation continues in most PLWH, despite virological suppression, in particular in those individuals who started cART in the acute phase of infection. In this study, we investigated the plasma viral load of HIV-infected treatment-naive participants at baseline and after six (6) months on treatment. We demonstrated that the plasma viral load of HIV-infected treatment-naive participants at baseline and after six (6) months on treatment were significantly suppressed. Systematic assessment for antiretroviral treatment response is a fundamental aspect in addressing the issues associated with the poor clinical consequence including immunologic failures among HIV-positive patients on cART. We employed quasi-experimental design, where non-probability sampling techniques were used in recruiting thirty-eight (38) cART naive HIV patients up to six (6) months on cART and ten (10) controls. We quantified the plasma HIV RNA using Hologic Panther Platform. The mean ± SD age of the HIV-infected cART naive participants was 36.16 (±8.5) years. Most of the participants were female constituting 68.4% (26/38) of the total number of cases studied. The median and interquartile range (IQR) of the viral load of HIV-infected cART naive participants at baseline and on treatment were 761,420 copies/ml (240794-2704986) and 30 copies/ml (30-30) respectively. The result shows a high percentage of plasma viral suppression in 6 months with viral load 82% (<30 copies/ml) and 18% (≥30 copies/ml) virological failure. This study shows the beneficial effect of immune-virological suppression following the introduction of cART. This may be the reason for the early initiation of cART (test and treat policy) and commitments of the center in terms of counselling, follow-up, and regular assessment.