Depression and Coping Are Associated with Failure of Adherence to Antiretroviral Therapy Among People Living with HIV/AIDS.

Sustained adherence to antiretroviral therapy (ART) is critical in the prevention of drug resistance, disease progression, and death. We aimed to assess the level of ART adherence among 112 people living with HIV/AIDS (PLWHA) and to determine associated factors with that. The socioeconomic aspects were evaluated by medical records; the adherence, depression, and coping by specific questionnaires. Although most patients have undetectable viral load (79%) and CD4+ T count >500 cells/mm3 (65%), two-third (66%) of them exhibited a lower adherence, which was directly associated with some signs of depression (p = .006) presented by 65% of them. Some risk factors to presence of depression were female gender (p = .008) and low income (p = .013). In addition, most participants who reported tobacco (33%) and alcohol (29%) consumption had a low or intermediate adherence score. Among the coping strategies, self-control (p = .029), social support (p = .006), problem solving (p = .013), and positive reappraisal (p = .049) led to an improvement in adherence.

Bone marrow necrosis related to paracoccidioidomycosis: the first eight cases identified at autopsy.

AIMS: To report the first eight bone marrow necrosis (BMN) cases related to paracoccidioidomycosis (PCM) from patient autopsies with well-documented bone marrow (BM) histology and cytology. METHODS AND RESULTS: A retrospective evaluation was performed on BM specimens from eight autopsied patients from Botucatu University Hospital with PCM-related BMN. Relevant BMN literature was searched and analysed. CONCLUSIONS: All eight patients had acute PCM. Six had histological only (biopsies) and two cytological only (smears) specimens. Five biopsy specimens revealed severe and one mild coagulation patterned necrotic areas. Five had osteonecrosis. The cytological specimens also showed typical BMN patterns. Paracoccidioides brasiliensis yeast forms were visible within necrotic areas in all cases.

Evaluation of DNA polymorphisms amplified by arbitrary primers (RAPD) as genetically associated elements to differentiate virulent and non-virulent Paracoccidioides brasiliensis isolates.

Randomly amplified polymorphic DNA (RAPD) analysis of 35 Paracoccidioides brasiliensis isolates was carried out to evaluate the correlation of RAPD profiles with the virulence degree or the type of the clinical manifestations of human paracoccidioidomycosis. The dendrogram presented two main groups sharing 64% genetic similarity. Group A included two isolates from patients with chronic paracoccidioidomycosis; group B comprised the following isolates showing 65% similarity: two non-virulent, six attenuated, five virulent, eight from patients with chronic paracoccidioidomycosis and two from patients with acute paracoccidioidomycosis. The virulent Pb18 isolate and six attenuated or non-virulent samples derived from it were genetically indistinguishable (100% of similarity). Thus, in our study, RAPD patterns could not discriminate among 35 P. brasiliensis isolates according to their differences either in the degree of virulence or in the type of the clinical manifestation of this fungal infection.

Razöes do näo uso do preservativo masculino entre pacientes com infecçäo ou näo pelo HIV / Reasons of the non use of the masculine condom among patient with onfection or not for HIV

Desde o aparecimento da AIDS o uso do preservativo masculino nas relaçöes sexuais é uma das formas para impedir a disseminaçäo da doença. Esta pesquisa teve por objetivo obter e analisar relatos verbais de razöes atribuídas para o näo uso do preservativo nas relaçöes sexuais entre portadores ou näo do HIV. Entrevistaram-se 14 pacientes com idade entre 23 e 30 anos, 78 por cento tinham escolaridade equivalente ao primeiro grau incompleto, 50 por cento referiam tempo de convívio com o companheiro de um período maior ou igual a seis anos