Encyclopedia of Diets - A Guide to Health and Nutrition

HAART is not one drug but a combination of various

antiretroviral agents given to patients to prevent the

virus from replicating and to discourage mutations of

the virus. The drugs must be taken in combination

because no medication by itself is able to suppress

HIV for very long. One early problem with HAART

was the complicated dosing schedules of the different

drugs prescribed for an individual patient. To encour-

age adherence to treatment schedules (which must be

at least 98% complete to protect the patient from

developing a strain of the virus resistant to

HAART), some pharmaceutical companies developed

fixed-dose combinations. A fixed-dose combination is

a medication in which several antiretroviral drugs that

are known to work well together are combined in a

single pill.

Guidelines for offering HAART treatment to

patients were published in the late 1990s because the

drugs have so many adverse effects (including hair

loss, muscle cramps and pains, kidney or liver failure,

insomnia, inflammation of the pancreas, dizziness and

mental confusion, headache, nausea and vomiting,

and numbness in hands or feet) that many patients

were not compliant with dosage schedules and devel-

oped drug-resistant mutations of the HIV virus. Rec-

ommendations for HAART have been revised several

KEY TERMS

Acquired immune deficiency syndrome (AIDS)—

HIV infection that has led to certain opportunistic

infections, cancers, or a CD4þT-lymphocyte (helper

cell) blood cell count lower than 200/mL.

Acute retroviral syndrome (ARS)—A syndrome that

develops in about 30% of HIV patients within a few

weeks of infection. ARS is characterized by nausea,

vomiting, fever, headache, general tiredness, and

muscle cramps.

Carrier—A person who bears or carries a disease

agent in or on their body and can transmit the disease

to others, but is immune to the disease or has no

symptoms of it.

Colonic—Sometimes called colonic hydrotherapy, a

colonic is a procedure similar to an enema in which

the patient’s colon is irrigated (washed out) with

large amounts of water. Some people undergoing a

detoxification diet have one or more colonics to

remove fecal matter remaining in the intestines dur-

ing the diet; however, this procedure is discouraged

by mainstream physicians because of its potential

risks to health.

Dietitian—A health care professional who special-

izes in individual or group nutritional planning, pub-

lic education in nutrition, or research in food

science. To be licensed as a registered dietitian

(RD) in the United States, a person must complete a

bachelor’s degree in a nutrition-related field and

pass a state licensing examination. Dietitians are

also called nutritionists.

Highly active antiretroviral therapy (HAART)—The

major form of pharmacological treatment for HIV

since 1996. HAART is a combination of several

different antiretroviral drugs selected for patients

on an individual basis. It is not a cure for HIV

infection but acts to slow the replication of the

virus and discourage new mutations. HAART has

a number of side effects that complicate main-

taining good nutrition in HIV patients.

Lipodystrophy—The medical term for redistribution

of body fat in response to HAART, insulin injections

in diabetics, or rare hereditary disorders.

Malabsorption syndrome—A condition character-

ized by indigestion, bloating, diarrhea, loss of appe-

tite, and weakness, caused by poor absorption of

nutrients from food as a result of HIV infection itself,

giardiasis or other opportunistic infections of the

digestive tract, or certain surgical procedures involv-

ing the stomach or intestines.

Opportunistic infection—An infection caused by a

normally harmless organism that causes disease

when the host’s immune system in weakened.

Opportunistic infections are a major problem in

the medical and nutritional care of HIV patients.

Retrovirus—A single-stranded virus that replicates

by reverse transcription to produce DNA copies

that are incorporated into the genome of infected

cells. AIDS is caused by a retrovirus.

Wasting syndrome—A combination of weight loss

and change in composition of body tissues that

occurs in patients with HIV infection. Typically, the

patient’s body loses lean muscle tissue and replaces

it with fat as well as losing weight overall.

AIDS/HIV infection