Tracking Transmitted HIV Drug Resistance in a Rural Southern Community
Transmitted HIV drug resistance is a growing problem. Researchers found 20% of treat-naive HIV patients in a rural Southern US community had such transmitted drug resistant strains of the virus.
Patients with HIV who develop drug resistance can transmit their strains to others.
In a study presented at IDWeek 2016 in New Orleans, LA, researchers discussed their retrospective study of transmitted drug resistance (TDR) in a rural Southern US county.
Ahmed Abubaker, MD, an infectious disease specialist at East Carolina University in Greenville, NC and colleagues conducted a study of all newly diagnosed HIV patients who had not been getting antiretroviral therapy. They collected demographic information, lab results including CD4 counts, viral load, and HIV genotype.
They noted whether transmitted drug resistance was present as well as individual mutations in the virus.
There were 210 patients whose charts were part of the study.
Forty-five were excluded for various reasons including unavailable genotype results.
They found the prevalence of TDR was 20% overall.
Gender, race and county of residence were not associated with the presence of TDR but being younger than 25 and being an man who had sex with men was found to be a common risk factor.
The concluded that “targeted infection prevention programs are needed in order to limit the further spread of resistant HIV-1 in this population in eastern North Carolina.”
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