Comparative evaluation of disease severity at diagnose time in HIV and HTLV-1 coinfection with HIV infection in Mashhad

Background: Mashhad in northeast of Iran is an endemic focus for HTLV-1 infection that is very rare in the world .Most previous clinical studies on patient’s with HIV and HTLV-I coinfection ; emphasized on viral load , CD4 count and clinical stages; this study not only evaluated this parameters in patients with coinfection but also determined the disease severity at diagnosis, the female to male ratio, the prevalence of HTLV-I infection in HIV patients , means and variances of hemoglobin and platelet and absolute neutrophil count . Methods and Materials : In this cross-sectional study on mashhad’s infectious disease and behavioral consultation center documents in 2011-2012; means of CD4 count, hemoglobin, platelet, absolute neutrophil count ,clinical stage and disease severity at diagnosis according to the WHO classification were compared between 18 patient’s with HIV, HTLV-I coinfection and 18 patient’s with HIV infection alone. For comparing this parameters between two groups, independent t-test and Mann-Witney test were used. Results: In this center, the prevalence of HTLV-I infection in HIV patients was equal to 4.53 %, a significant difference with HTLV-I prevalence in the general population of Mashhad (2.12%) was found. Means of hematologic indices were in normal range and there were not significant differences between two groups .The mean of CD4 count in coinfection patients was equal to 384 and in patients with HIV infection alone was equal to 473 and there was not significant difference between two groups. Means of clinical stage and disease severity at diagnosis didn’t show advanced and sever disease and the differences were not significant. Conclusions: Patients with coinfection such as patients with HIV infection alone were not in advanced stages at diagnosis time. The HTLV-I infection in HIV patients don’t improve or worsen the clinical and immunological status of disease.