Clinical Staging of HIV Infection as a Surrogate for CD4 Count in HIV-Infected Children

BACKGROUND: Human immunodeficiency virus (HIV) infection is a major cause of infant and childhood mortality and morbidity; without treatment about 50% of them will succumb to HIV/AIDS before the age of two years. OBJECTIVE: To evaluate the usefulness of clinical manifestations of HIV infection as a surrogate for CD4 counts in antiretroviral-naive HIV-infected children. METHODS: Newly diagnosed HIV-infected children, antiretroviral-naïve attending a paediatric infectious diseases unit were enrolled. The clinical manifesta-tions, age, sex, and WHO clinical stage of each patient were determined. CD4 count and CD4% were estimated at presentation and correlated with various clinical manifestations of HIV disease. RESULTS: The study population consisted of 126 children, aged four months to 14 years with a mean of 3.2 ± 2.7 years and a male to female ratio of 1.2:1. Eighty-one percent of the children acquired HIV infection through mother-to-child transmission (MTCT). The CD4% was higher in infants (p<0.000) and lower in children over five years of age. Eighty-six percent of them in stage 4 were children less than 24 months of age. CD4% showed a modest correlation with WHO paediatric clinical staging (r=0.62, p=0.002). Patients with lymphadenopathy (stage 1) had a high absolute CD4 count whereas patients with failure to thrive had a relatively low absolute CD4 count. CONCLUSION: WHO Paediatric clinical staging for HIV infection correlates with CD4% and can be used as a surrogate to CD4. CD4 count and CD4% vary with age and complications of the disease.