A retrospective case-cohort study comparing treatment outcomes in abacavir versus stavudine containing first line antiretroviral treatment regimens in children

by Haseena Cassim, Kennedy Otwombe, Erica Lazarus, Afaaf Liberty, Glenda E. Gray, Oppel B. W. Greeff, Avy Violari

Introduction

The current World Health Organization guideline for first line antiretroviral therapy (ART) in HIV-infected children recommends the use of abacavir and lamivudine as nucleoside backbones and no longer includes stavudine. We compared treatment outcomes with abacavir (ABC) versus stavudine (d4T) in a cohort of HIV-1 infected children 6 and 12 months after antiretroviral therapy was initiated.

Methods

This was a retrospective case-cohort study, using programmatic data from children enrolled in the Paediatric Wellness Programme at the Perinatal HIV Research Unit in Soweto, South Africa between 2005 and 2013. Children on abacavir/stavudine who had initiated ART at age Results

We identified 57 eligible ABC cases and selected 114 matched d4T controls. Overall, 57% were females and 89% started treatment at age 90% for ABC and d4T were similar too (95% in ABC vs. 86% in d4T, p = 0.10). The proportion of children who died over 12 months was 3.5% in the ABC and 7.9% in the d4T group (p = 0.27). Similarly, the anthropometric measures were comparable.

Conclusions

It is reassuring that in the short term, in this group of patients, the treatment outcomes were similar.

from # All Medicine by Alexandros G. Sfakianakis via Alexandros G.Sfakianakis on Inoreader http://ift.tt/2u0yRnX
via IFTTT