Wednesday, May 27, 2009

Smoking Is Even More Dangerous To Individuals With HIV Than Those Without

If you have HIV and are a smoker, you now have another reason to quit. In recent research done by Syed Kadri at Ohio State University Medical Centre, patients with HIV were found to be twice as likely to experience a decrease in lung function.

The immediate effects of quitting smoking are:
*Within 8 hours, carbon monoxide levels drop in your body and oxygen levels in your blood increases.
*After 2 days, your sense of smell and taste begin to improve.
*Within 2 weeks to 3 months, your lungs work better making it easier to breathe.
*After 1 to 9 months, coughing, sinus congestion, tiredness and shortness of breath improve.

An excellent resource for those who would like to quit, as well as for those who don’t, is the Canadian Cancer Society

How do you feel about being positive and continuing to smoke? Is more information or support needed to assist you break the habit? Be well!

Wednesday, May 6, 2009

Interpretating Your Lab Results, Viral Load

Viral load is the term used to describe the amount of virus in your blood ( # of HIV RNA copies per millilitre). The more HIV viruses that are in your blood, the faster your CD4’s will be depleted and your risk of disease and illness will increase.

When first infected with HIV (sero-converting), your viral load may be around 100,000 or more. This will soon drop to around 10-30 thousand until you start HAART. If your HAART regime is working, your viral load should fall to “undetectable” within approximately 3-6 months. This means that you have less than 40 HIV RNA copies per ml of blood. One of the goals of HAART is to keep that viral load at “undetectable”. You can expect to have lab tests anywhere from every 1-6 months once your viral load has stabilized.

We’d love to hear your questions about your viral load, or any other lab results that you may receive. Until next week, be well!