Pettit study finds AIDS-defining events increase mortality risk
The Centers for Disease Control and Prevention recognizes 27 ADEs, from pneumonia to tuberculosis to cervical cancer to wasting syndrome. When a death is attributed to AIDS, usually one or more recognized ADEs is involved.
The availability of effective antiretroviral drug therapy has rendered HIV/AIDS a chronic disease in much of the world, no longer acutely fatal when treated. Among people living with HIV, at least in some developed regions, a so-called non-AIDS death appears at least as likely as a death attributed directly to AIDS.
In a study published recently in the Journal of the International AIDS Society, April Pettit, MD, MPH, assistant professor of Medicine, and colleagues focus on non-AIDS mortality among people on antiretroviral treatment in relatively high-income countries. They specifically examine mortality among patients who’ve survived an ADE since starting their HIV/AIDS drug therapy.