Metabolic dysfunctions in non-antiretroviral treated HIV/AIDS patients

AIDS related metabolic and morphologic disorders have been attributed to protease inhibitor based antiretroviral therapy. HIV/AIDS is however amulti-systemic disease with potential for alteration ofmetabolic and endocrine functions. To determine ifmetabolic disorders occur in non-antiretroviral treatedHIV/AIDS patients. Case control study of prospectively recruited 48 HIV seropositive patients, and randomly selected age and sex-matched controls. Main outcome measures included plasma lipid concentrations and intravenous glucose tolerance measured using glucose assimilation coefficient, K. A K-value less than 1.2 constituted an impaired glucose tolerance. Compared to the controls,HIV/AIDS patients had significantly lower glucose assimilation coefficient (1.5 ± 0.5 versus 2.7 ± 0.9; p < 0.001); higher proportion of individuals with impaired glucose tolerance (35.4% versus 7.5%; P = 0.01); and higher plasma triglyceride concentration (166.5 ± 20.7mg/dL versus 148.9 ± 13.5mg/dL; p = 0.04). The proportion of patients with hypertriglyceridaemia was also significantly higher among patients than controls (56.3%versus 17.5%; p = 0.04). Metabolic dysfunctions occur inHIV/AIDS independent of antiretroviral therapy.Routinemonitor of plasma lipids and glucose is therefore advocated inHIV/AIDS patients.Keywords: HIV/AIDS,metabolic dysfunction