dc.description.abstract |
Effective combination antiretroviral therapy (ART) has enabled human immunodeficiency virus
(HIV) infection to evolve from a generally fatal condition to a manageable chronic disease. This
transition began two decades ago in high-income countries, and has more recently begun in lower
income, HIV endemic countries (HIV-ECs). With this transition, has come a concurrent shift in
clinical and public health burden from AIDS-related complications and opportunistic infections, to
those associated with well-controlled HIV disease, including cardiovascular disease (CVD). In the
current treatment era, traditional CVD risk factors and HIV-related factors both contribute to an
elevated risk of myocardial infarction, stroke, heart failure, and arrhythmias. In HIV-ECs, the high
prevalence of persons living with HIV and growing prevalence of CVD risk factors will contribute
to a growing epidemic of HIV-associated CVD. In this review, we discuss the epidemiology and
pathophysiology of cardiovascular complications of HIV and the resultant implications for public
health efforts in HIV-ECs. |
en_US |