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Virological response to highly active antiretroviral therapy is unaffected by antituberculosis therapy.

Breen RA, Miller RF, Gorsuch T, Smith CJ, Ainsworth J, Ballinger J, Swaden L, Cropley I, Johnson MA, Lipman MC

Department of HIV Medicine, Royal Free Hospital, and Department of Primary Care and Population Sciences, Royal Free and University College Medical School, London, United Kingdom. r.breen@medsch.ucl.ac.uk

We compared 156 human immunodeficiency virus (HIV)-infected patients who had tuberculosis with control populations of similar size. Of 111 patients with HIV infection and tuberculosis who received highly active antiretroviral therapy (HAART) and therapy for tuberculosis concurrently, 92 (83%) achieved or maintained virus loads of <50 copies/mL, and 99 (89%) achieved or maintained a >or=2 log10 reduction in virus load after 6 months. Virological response and changes in CD4 cell count were equivalent to those in 111 matched HIV-infected subjects without tuberculosis starting HAART. Tuberculosis recurrence rates were similar to those found in an HIV-uninfected population of 156 subjects (3% and 1%, respectively). Treatment for HIV and tuberculosis does not compromise outcomes for either disease.

Published 18 April 2006 in J Infect Dis, 193(10): 1437-40.
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