According to researchers, combining multivitamins and selenium supplements slows the progress in early HIV infections.
The study also revealed that when apart, the vitamins without the selenium supplements had no effect, according to the Botswana study. This was reported carried in the Journal of the American Medical Association.
In this particular study, patients with more advanced stages of HIV were studied and they already had comorbidity issues like tuberculosis. Those already on antiretroviral treatment were also studied.
According to Marianna Baum, PhD of the Florida International University in Miami and her colleagues, this intervention had cut the risk of the requirement for antiretroviral treatment in half.
This is the first study in Botswana to investigate the effect of micronutrient supplementation on patients with a plasma level of CD4-positive T-cell count which “was greater than 350 per microliter and who were not on antiretroviral therapy during the study”, Baum and colleagues reported.
According to Baum, the team enrolled 878 people with a median CD4 cell count of 420 cells per microliter and randomly assigned them to one of four study arms: placebo, micronutrients, selenium, or micronutrients plus selenium, she told an interviewer with Med Page Today. According to David Wohl of the University of North Carolina, “what’s nice about this study is that a simple and inexpensive intervention could have “effects that were fairly profound” and that slowed the decline of immune function. On the other hand, HIV therapy, when it’s eventually used, would probably “trump any effect of micronutrients,” he continued. “This means you may not need always to use an HIV medication to achieve at least part of what we try to accomplish with therapy,” he explained.
According to the study, the medications were taken daily while the supplement pills contained thiamine, riboflavin, niacin, B6, B12, folic acid, and vitamins C and E. Those in the selenium arms got 200 mg of the element daily.
The primary endpoint was HIV progression, defined originally as reaching a CD4 cell count of less than 200 per microliter. Because of a change in national guidelines in March 2008, the researchers redefined HIV progression as reaching a CD4 count of less than 250 cells per microliter, the report indicated.
The study had support from the National Institute on Drug Abuse. The authors did not report any potential conflicts. (original story can be found at Med Page Today)
