HIV

Harry Webster, RPh, a registered pharmacist at Walgreens and a member of the LGBTQIA+ community, discusses the impact of stigma associated with PrEP and HIV on patients seeking to treat or prevent HIV.

Collaborative efforts between patients, physicians, pharmacists, and other essential personnel can further promote the effectiveness of PrEP regimens.

Brad McElya, PharmD, director of specialty health solutions at Walgreens, discusses the critical role pharmacists play in providing HIV prevention drugs in communities across America.

Specialty pharmacists’ roles have grown in new and exciting ways in recent years, and those changes have directly impacted health outcomes for all specialty patients, including patients with HIV.

Analyzing how off-target antibodies may be undermining HIV vaccine prototypes allows for design improvements.

Multimorbidity, health-related quality of life, and stigma and discrimination continue to be major issues for people living with HIV, including those who have achieved viral suppression, according to a consensus statement from a multidisciplinary panel of HIV experts published in Nature Communications.

Truvada is a medicine people at risk for HIV should take to prevent infection with the virus from various ways, such as sex or injection drug use.

A generic TDF/FTC costs as low as $30 per month, compared with about $1800 per month for branded TAF/FTC

The investigators noted that the levels of islatravir in peripheral blood mononuclear cells remained above the efficacy pharmacokinetics threshold for PrEP for both doses studied (60 mg and 120 mg) for 8 weeks following the last study dose.

Workflow in the clinic and the pharmacy are critical for the implementation of a new and novel medication therapy, such as cabotegravir-rilpivirine.

A pooled analysis of a 48-week open-label extension of a pair of phase 3 studies found that 99% of patients with HIV who initiated treatment using bictegravir 50 mg/emtricitabine 200 mg/tenofovir alafenamide 25 mg tablets maintained an undetectable viral load through 4 years of follow-up.

The drug also resulted in zero cases of virologic failure and no development of resistance in virologically suppressed adults with HIV-1 who have not previously experienced virologic failure.

In one program, hospital pharmacists received alerts whenever an antiretroviral was prescribed in the emergency department, enabling prompt action.

Because viral clearance is compromised if HIV is allowed to replicate for an extended period of time—resulting in extensive damage to the immune system—controlling HIV with antiretroviral therapy may be critical to preventing this type of viral evolution in SARS-CoV-2 in patients with advanced HIV.

Despite significant medical advancements related to HIV treatment and quality of life, the risk of suicide in patients is high and health care providers should prioritize mental health screenings in this population.

Investigators have identified metabolic and glycomic signatures in blood samples of post-treatment controllers, a rare population of HIV-infected individuals who can naturally sustain viral suppression after antiretroviral therapy.

Lenacapavir was granted Breakthrough Therapy Designation in May 2019 and is a potential first-in-class capsid inhibitor for the treatment of HIV-1 infection without overlapping resistance with any currently approved antiretroviral therapy.

June 27 is National HIV Testing Day, so Pharmacy Times interviewed Warren O, a person living with HIV for 11 years who has first-hand experience with HIV stigma, on his perspective on the critical role of testing all sexually active individuals who may be at risk for HIV.

Investigators have found bNAbs for HIV, hepatitis C, and influenza, among others.

Pharmacists can implement several recommendations into their practice, regardless of the setting.

This reduction in white matter has been well-documented, but the exact mechanism of action has been unknown until now, according to the study authors.

Cabenuva, the first long-acting injectable for the treatment of HIV, is a 2-drug copackaged product containing cabotegravir and rilpivirine.

Warren O, a person living with HIV for 11 years who has first-hand experience with HIV stigma, discusses his perspective on how the reduction of stigma could help to end the HIV epidemic.

This group of antibodies is able to attach to the outer layer of HIV at a patch of glycans—chain-like structures of sugars that are on the surface of cells, including the outer shells of viruses.

Research could allow the study of long-term HIV infections and the testing of new curative therapies.

The researchers are hopeful this could eventually lead to the elimination of long-term antiretroviral treatment as a lifelong necessity for patients with HIV.

Final data from a phase 3 trial assessing evolocumab in patients with HIV who have high cholesterol confirmed the safety and efficacy of the drug as a treatment.

A combination immunotherapy of interleukin-21 (IL-21) and interferon alpha (IFN-alpha) in combination with antiretroviral therapy (ART) is effective in generating highly functional natural killer (NK) cells that can help control and reduce simian immunodeficiency virus (SIV) in animal models.

Certain pre-existing conditions are common among people living with HIV/AIDS, which may contribute to the severity of their COVID-19 cases.

HIV is currently not curable but can be controlled with effective treatment options to allow patients to live a healthy life with better quality.