HIV infected children likely to suffer cognitive impairment: study

HIV infected children likely to suffer cognitive impairment: study

News

1. A new study reveals Children infected with the Human Immunodeficiency Virus (HIV) have to endure a significant adverse impact on their neurodevelopment and cognitive functioning

Important facts

2. The study is carried out by a team of doctors at Fortis Memorial Research Institute in Gurugram, King George Medical University in Lucknow and Sidra Medicine in Doha, Qatar.
3. The neuropsychological assessment was carried out through a specially designed test for children to detect memory span, verbal meaning, mazes, learning names, quantity, discs, hidden figure, closure and exclusion.
4. Findings

• Report highlighted significant fluctuations in regions of the brain that are associated with auditory, language, sensory and motor functional networks of HIV infected children. Similar characteristics was earlier detected in adults.
• Infected children were also found to have significantly decreased Amplitude of Low Frequency Fluctuations (ALFF) and Functional connectivity (FC) in multiple brain regions that are related to cognition.

5. The findings will facilitate early detection of structural and functional brain changes, allowing appropriate treatment and therapies to improve functional activities in children with immunity disorders.

5. About HIV

• HIV is a virus that attacks the immune system and is known to affect almost every organ in the human body.
• Nearly 60,000 children in India are currently taking Anti-Retroviral Therapy (ART) for HIV. Doctors treating these children commonly observe slackened physical as well as mental growth.
• The virus is present in patient’s bloodstream and affects the brain, heart, kidney, liver etc., leaving the patient extremely immuno-compromised

7. Doctors suggests the key to achieving overall growth in HIV infected children is good diet, 100% medicine compliance and regular physical activity.
8. This would ensure that their viral load is low and CD-4 (immune cells) count is high.