title: Hospitalizations and its related factors in HIV/AIDS patients in Tehran, Iran.
abstract: BACKGROUND
  HIV/AIDS patients are mainly hospitalized for HIV-related diseases and opportunistic infections.ions. This study was performed to determine the causes of hospitalization and its related factors in HIV/AIDS patients in Tehran's Imam Khomeini Hospital during 2009-2012.
  
  
  METHODS
  This study was a descriptive cross-sectional study. HIV patients admitted to the Imam Khomeini Hospital were included in the study through census method, during the study. Demographic variables, hepatitis co-infection, CD4 count, history of receiving anti- retroviral therapy (ART), cause of admission, length of hospitalization and patient's outcome were recorded. Data were analyzed by SPSS software and by means of Chisquare and Mann Whitney U tests.
  
  
  RESULTS
  During the study, 555 HIV patients were included in, 84.9% of whom were male, with the mean age of 36.59±8.51 years and the average length of hospitalization for 16.04±18.82 days. Opportunistic infections were the most common cause of hospitalization (46.5%) with prevalent of which was pulmonary tuberculosis being the most prevalent (37.6%). Patients suffering from opportunistic infections had significantly lower CD4 count and longer hospitalization than the other diseases. A significant difference was detected between patients outcome and the history of ART.
  
  
  CONCLUSIONS
  Low CD4 count may contribute to an increase in number and length of hospitalization in HIV/AIDS patients. Accordingly, it appears to affect outcome of their treatment and ART was accompanied by a drop in the death rate of hospitalized patients.
authors.affiliation: 1. Professor of Infectious Diseases, Department of Infectious and Tropical Diseases, Imam Khomeini Hospital, Tehran University of Medical Sciences, Tehran, Iran. hajiabdo@tums.ac.ir.
authors.forename: Mahboobeh
authors.initials: M
authors.lastname: Hajiabdolbaghi
authors.affiliation: 2. Associate Professor of Infectious Diseases, Department of Infectious and Tropical Diseases, Imam Khomeini Hospital, Tehran University of Medical Sciences, Tehran, Iran. jafari_sirous@yahoo.com.
authors.forename: Sirous
authors.initials: S
authors.lastname: Jafari
authors.affiliation: 3. Specialist of Infectious Diseases, Department of Infectious and Tropical Diseases, Imam Khomeini Hospital, Tehran University of Medical Sciences, Tehran, Iran. sedighehmansori@yahoo.com.
authors.forename: Sedighe
authors.initials: S
authors.lastname: Mansouri
authors.affiliation: 4. Specialist of Infectious Diseases, Department of Infectious and Tropical Diseases, Imam Khomeini Hospital, Tehran University of Medical Sciences, Tehran, Iran. hyaghooby@razi.tums.ac.ir.
authors.forename: Mojtaba
authors.initials: M
authors.lastname: Hedayat Yaghoobi
keywords: AIDS; ART; HIV Infection; Hospitalization; Opportunistic infections