Some non-AIDS conditions hint at HIV infection in adults

BOSTON – Bacterial pneumonia, herpes zoster, and thrombocytopenia in adults of any age could be signs of a possible undiagnosed HIV infection and should trigger HIV testing, investigators in a study of aging veterans contend.

Among adults younger than age 60 years, findings of anemia and/or lymphocytopenia also should trigger HIV testing, said Amy C. Justice, MD, PhD, from the Yale School of Public Health, New Haven, Conn.

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“Older people are more likely to present with advanced HIV and specific non-AIDS conditions. Convergence of HIV and aging-associated non-AIDS conditions contributes to delays in diagnosis,” she said at the annual Conference on Retroviruses and Opportunistic Infections.

There are sparse data on how older persons first present with HIV infections, but evidence from a cross-sectional study of 44,491 HIV-infected individuals in the North American AIDS Cohort Collaboration on Research and Design showed that adults aged 50 years and older have lower CD4 cell counts and more advanced HIV disease at the time of presentation.