title: Age and CD4 count of vertically HIV-infected children at the time of diagnosis: what are independent predictors for being symptomatic and CD4 counts drop?
abstract: A review of the literature has revealed that data on HIV-infected clinical presentations, age at the time of diagnosis and level of immunosuppression in resource-poor settings are very limited. A multicenter retrospective and cross-sectional method was used to analyze 1163 children <15 years of age. More than half of the children were >5 years of age (mean ± SD age 4.9 ± 3.2). About 54% of children were symptomatic. Tuberculosis and chronic dermatologic disorders were the commonest co-infections. The severity of immunosuppression was highest in preschool children (46.6%) and early adolescents (41.3%). After adjustment for sex, age, pattern of feeding and hemoglobin level, multinomial logistic regression showed that CD4 count 200-499, 500-999 and Tigray ethnicity were independently associated with being symptomatic. More than one-third of the children were in a state of severe immunosuppression and more than half were immunologically eligible for antiretroviral treatment.
authors.affiliation: Department of Medicine, Hawassa University, Awassa, Ethiopia. yifrub@yahoo.com
authors.forename: Yifru
authors.initials: Y
authors.lastname: Berhan
mesh_terms: D000293:Adolescent; D019380:Anti-HIV Agents / Q000627:therapeutic use; D015415:Biomarkers; D018791:CD4 Lymphocyte Count; D002648:Child; D003430:Cross-Sectional Studies; D005002:Ethiopia; D015658:HIV Infections / Q000188:drug therapy / Q000276:immunology* / Q000635:transmission / Q000821:virology*; D015497:HIV-1 / Q000187:drug effects / Q000276:immunology*; D006801:Humans; D007165:Immunosuppression Therapy; D007223:Infant; D018445:Infectious Disease Transmission, Vertical; D016015:Logistic Models; D008297:Male; D012189:Retrospective Studies; D012307:Risk Factors; D012720:Severity of Illness Index; D017678:Sex Distribution; D019562:Viral Load
chemical_list: D019380:Anti-HIV Agents; D015415:Biomarkers