Ten years later: a single hospital experience with malignancy in HIV/AIDS.

BACKGROUND AND OBJECTIVE

We present our experience in the era of HAART with 5,112 patients having HIV infection or AIDS, treated between 2002 and 2006 in our hospital, 182 of whom had malignancies (3.56%). We compared our findings to those from a similar cohort of patients studied 10 years earlier.

METHODS

The charts were reviewed and data was electronically collected as in our 1993-1998 study. Similar statistical analyses were performed in both studies and the results were compared.

RESULTS

For the current study the average patient age increased by 9 years. A decrease in AIDS-defining cancers (ADC), from 63.6% to 37.3% and a higher incidence of non-AIDS-defining cancers (NADC), 62.7 as opposed to 37.9% was found. No decrease in the incidence of non-Hodgkin's B cell lymphoma (NHL) was noted. There was an increase in the number of opportunistic infections notably hepatitis C virus (HCV) and hepatitis B virus (HBV).

CONCLUSIONS

HIV/AIDS patients on HAART are older, have lower rates of AIDS related Kaposi's sarcoma and a higher incidence of NADCs than did patients in the early HAART era. No decrease in the proportion of NHL was observed.