Prevalence of Antiretroviral Therapy Use among HIV/AIDS Patients in a District Hospital

Introduction: Prevention of Human Immunodeficiency Virus infection is a high priority for the government of Nepal, so the government has been scaling up Anti Retroviral Therapy centers throughout the country. The objective of our study was to find out the prevalence of people living with Human Immunodeficiency Virus infection on Anti Retroviral Therapy service. Methods: This descriptive cross-sectional study was done in Lamjung district hospital, from May 2017 till August 2017 after taking ethical clearance from the institutional review committee. The study was done in 96 patients and convenience sampling was done. The data collected was entered in Microsoft Excel and analyzed in Statistical Packages for Social Sciences version 17.0, point estimate at 95% Confidence Interval was calculated along with frequency and proportion for binary data. Results: Out of the total 109 patients enrolled at the hospital, 85 (78%) were on ongoing Anti Retroviral Therapy. The predominant age group among patients using Anti Retroviral Therapy was 25-34 years 27 (31.7%) and the five most common clinical manifestation/opportunistic infections were fever 40 (47.1%), diarrhea 34 (40%), fatigue/generalized weakness 32 (37.6%), loss of appetite 25 (29.4%) and headache 18 (21.2%) among them. Out of total patients, 14 (12.8%) of our patients were under 14 years of age. We found 71 (83.6%) of the patients continued the original first-line regimen and in 14 (16.5%) one or two drugs were substituted in the original regimen. Conclusions: Our study showed a similar prevalence of people living with Human Immunodeficiency Virus infection on Anti Retroviral Therapy service with the other studies done within Nepal.