According to a study, the patients
with human immunodeficiency virus (HIV) incur a higher chance of dying from
depressive symptoms compared to patients without HIV. Depression
affects approximately 20-40% of HIV patients making it the most frequently
reported mental health condition in people living with the virus. Depressive
disorders have previously been linked to augmented mortality in people with
chronic diseases, including heart disease, end-stage renal disease and
diabetes.
These comorbidities have made the
management of any of the following conditions really challenging for caregivers
and even more challenging for patients. Patients are subjects of many drug-drug
interactions and adverse drug reactions since these patients often have to use
multiple medications. Another way the disorder is impacting the healthcare
system is increased labor and institutional cost. While it true that depression
presents with many other pathological disorders for which numerous studies have
confirmed, the association between depression and infectious diseases on the
other hand has not been extensively studied.
Recently, in a study aimed to
investigate the link among the wide range of depressive disorders or symptoms,
HIV status of a patient and mortality, scientists discovered that symptoms of
depression are associated with death among veterans with HIV but not among
those without HIV infection.
The researchers were able to gather
data from participants of the Veteran’s Aging Cohort Study. The researchers
were able to compare the risk of death among Veterans who were depressed to
those not suffering with depression. They then studied the relationship between
depression and death among those infected with HIV to those without HIV.
Depression was measured in two ways using depressive symptoms questionnaire and
clinical diagnostic codes.
Among those with HIV infection,
they were able to discover a 23% increased mortality risk associated with
elevated depressive symptoms ascertained by the questionnaire but no
significantly increased mortality risk when depression was ascertained by the
codes. For HIV-uninfected people, there was a 6% increased mortality risk
associated with depressive disorders measured by the codes but no significant
increased mortality risk for elevated depressive symptoms assessed by the
questionnaire.
It is important to screen for and
treat depression particularly among those living with HIV due to the
observation that important therapeutic progress, improved life-expectancy, and
improved quality of life have been made through intervention with lifesaving antiretroviral.
The results of their findings strengthened the need to assess and treat
depressive symptoms and major depressive disorder in patients with and without
HIV infection with the aim of reducing mortality risk. The researchers were
able to discover the clinical guidelines recommending routine screening for
depressive symptoms, there is varying success in implementation resulting in
under diagnosis of depression among people with HIV infection.
