title: The impact of human immunodeficiency virus infection on the epidemiology and treatment of Trypanosoma brucei gambiense sleeping sickness in Nioki, Zaire.
abstract: To determine if there is an association between human immunodeficiency virus type 1 (HIV-1) infection and Trypanosoma brucei gambiense sleeping sickness, all incident cases of trypanosomiasis and a control group of blood donors presenting to the same rural hospital in Zaire were tested for anti-human immunodeficiency virus type 1 (anti-HIV-1) antibodies. There was no significant difference in the prevalence of HIV-1 infection between the two groups (7 of 220, [3.2%] for the incident cases and 8 of 388 [2.1%] for the blood donors; P = 0.56). Among the three HIV-1 seropositive incident cases of trypanosomiasis treated with difluoromethylornithine, two (67%) relapsed after treatment compared with four of 39 (10%) HIV-1 seronegative incident cases treated with the same drug (P = 0.05). These findings suggest that at the present time, HIV-1 infection is not having a significant impact on the incidence of T. brucei gambiense sleeping sickness in rural Zaire, but the possibility that incident cases of trypanosomiasis concurrently infected with HIV-1 may be at higher risk of treatment failure warrants further investigation.
authors.affiliation: Medical Research Council Laboratories, Banjul, The Gambia.
authors.forename: J
authors.initials: J
authors.lastname: Pepin
authors.forename: L
authors.initials: L
authors.lastname: Ethier
authors.forename: C
authors.initials: C
authors.lastname: Kazadi
authors.forename: F
authors.initials: F
authors.lastname: Milord
authors.forename: R
authors.initials: R
authors.lastname: Ryder
mesh_terms: D000293:Adolescent; D000328:Adult; D000367:Age Factors; D000818:Animals; D001782:Blood Donors; D015023:Democratic Republic of the Congo / Q000453:epidemiology; D005260:Female; D015483:HIV Antibodies / Q000097:blood; D015658:HIV Infections / Q000150:complications* / Q000453:epidemiology; D015497:HIV-1 / Q000276:immunology*; D006801:Humans; D015994:Incidence; D008297:Male; D008875:Middle Aged; D009790:Occupations; D015995:Prevalence; D012008:Recurrence; D012307:Risk Factors; D012424:Rural Population; D012725:Sexual Behavior; D014347:Trypanosoma brucei gambiense / Q000302:isolation & purification*; D014353:Trypanosomiasis, African / Q000150:complications* / Q000453:epidemiology
chemical_list: D015483:HIV Antibodies