Victoria Aramă 1,2, Ştefan Sorin Aramă 2, Daniela Adriana Ion 2, Cătălin Tilişcan 2, Raluca Mihăilescu 1, Ioana Olaru 1
1 National Institute of Infectious Diseases „Prof. Dr. Matei Balş”, Bucharest
2 University of Medicine and Pharmacy „Carol Davila”, Bucharest
Abstract
The metabolic syndrome is characterized by the clustering of classic and emerging risk factors for cardiovascular disease and diabetes. If the diagnosis can be accomplished by simple clinical and biochemical tests, its pathophysiologic chain of events is complex and not comprehensively understood. Since the introduction of HAART changes in fat distribution, dyslipidemia, dysglycemia, and other metabolic abnormalities are increasingly observed, and they present major challenges for clinicians involved in screening, evaluation and treatment of HIV/AIDS. There is an increasing literature suggesting that all metabolic syndrome components are strongly inherited. Given the high prevalence of these metabolic complications among HIV-positive patients, an increasing number of authors suggest that it might be useful to test the genetic individual risk, prior to the introduction of HAART. In doing so, it will be possible to design individual HAART regimens for each patient and the clinician will be able to take early measures to prevent the cardiovascular and metabolic complications.