Decoding HIV Drug Resistance
Jan. 8, 2007 — -- Scientists have a potential new weapon for their fight against AIDS -- a test that could tell doctors which drugs won't work for a given patient.
A new, highly sensitive test can detect tiny levels of drug-resistant HIV in the blood, say researchers at Duke University Medical Center. The test could help patients avoid medicine that would ultimately fail to fight their HIV infection. HIV can continue to spread and weaken a patient's immune system if it develops resistance to treatment medications. The treatment resistance, if unchecked and unnoticed, can make the progression from HIV to full-blown AIDS more likely.
Scientists know of about 30 mutations that can make HIV resistant to one of 20 drugs used to treat the infection. If doctors can identify which, if any, of those mutations are present on a given strain of HIV, they have a better chance of finding a drug that can successfully keep the virus in check.
Researchers hope this test will be the key to more effective and efficient treatments for HIV-infected patients, but this new test won't be ready for HIV patients anytime soon. Further studies need to confirm that the test is a reproducible one, something that labs across the country can carry out. Scientists don't know yet whether this test is easy and reliable enough for clinics to use.
Any scientific advance in the suppression of HIV is welcome news.
An ultrasensitive test to detect drug-resistant strains of the virus will undoubtedly become a helpful tool in the complicated arsenal of treatment options. Since the virus is constantly mutating (RNA viruses like HIV mutate rapidly -- 10 billion HIV-1 virus particles are generated daily), how well can this test keep up with the ever-changing virus?
Perhaps this ultrasensitive test would be more effective if there were more classes of drugs available.
I am an HIV-positive woman, and although I do not speak directly from firsthand experience (I've never needed medications), I can share observations based on my involvement with the HIV-affected community at large over the last 14 years.
An immediate benefit of this test would be knowledge for both doctor and patient that would improve treatment and eliminate the time and pain of experimenting with ineffective drugs.
Loreen Willenberg is a member of the Sacramento HIV Health Services in California. She was diagnosed with HIV in 1992. Contributions to this article were also made by John Martin, Kansas City Planning Council member; and Dave Casey, AIDS Treatment Activist's Coalition (ATAC) and Sacramento HIV Health Services Planning Council member.
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