AIDS DIAGNOSIS AND TREATMENT

ANALYSIS AND TEST

• The HIV antibody test ELISA (Enzyme-Immunosorbent).
• CD4 absolute lymphocyte count (less than 200 in case of illness).
• PCR for HIV.

The test for HIV infection in an individual is made ​​using a technique of "ELISA" ( enzyme-linked immunosorbent assay ). It is done in a few hours and is very sensitive in identifying HIV-positive. Most of the commercial test compare for quality and reliability with a more sophisticated technique called "Western Blot" which characterizes each marker to improve performance.

The counts are also performed to determine lymphocyte immune system involvement, and from 1995 was a technique (PCR, English acronym Chain Reaction Polymerase) that could measure the amount of HIV virus in the blood , which in turn is a reflection of the amount of virus that exist throughout the body.

TREATMENT

Applying for HIV PCR frozen blood samples from 10 or more years before he saw people who had very few viruses (low viral load) only 10% had developed AIDS, while people with large amount of virus (high viral load) levels had developed AIDS and died mostly.

Until 1995 it had a series of drugs called reverse transcriptase inhibitors Viral (Retrovir, Videx, HIVID) which, individually or in combination. were not very powerful effect, and also about HIV transitory, making delay the onset of AIDS in a person infected more than 2 years if used in delayed phase of AIDS death in 1 or 2 years.

This is because the virus can become resistant to these drugs because it is changing (mutating) every time you play (replica) of course, those who have large amounts of virus replication have a higher rate (and resistance) and the prognosis is worse than in the case they have few viruses. He was also with the above drugs was achieved on average by dividing by 10 or 50 the amount of virus in the blood, which, in a person he had. for example, 300,000 viruses per milliliter, a reduction is negligible and insufficient to prevent progression to AIDS.

Appeared in 1995-6, were sold in a series of drugs called protease inhibitors Viral (Norvir, Invirase, Crixivan), in combination with the above, achieved viral load divided by 1,000 or more, in some patients are able to do away of blood to these viruses and, keeping the treatment several years can perhaps completely eliminate the virus from the body.

The experience with two years of use is very good, with reductions in mortality of more than 50%, T4 lymphocyte recovery lost and marked improvement of symptoms of the disease.

These treatments are relatively well tolerated and administered by mouth (no need to inject). Although these treatments are very expensive (a protease inhibitor plus two transcriptase inhibitors represent a year more than 1,300,000 ptas) in Spain are covered by Social Security and, above all, the lives saved and the savings that occur in hospitalization costs outweigh its economic value.

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