HIV attacking central nervous system

Feb 17, 2002

i was diagnosed with encypholitis back in october at which time i was removed from all meds. I had bloodwork done and my t cells dropped from 910 to 527 in late December also viral from undetectable to 1600. New bloodwork done in middle of January showed a increase in T cells to 679 still without meds. and viral up to 25k . This I was happy to see, however i am having lots of trouble with fatigue , I am very irratatable at the drop of a hat. When I get anxious i seem to turn into a sorta retarded type person for periods of time. My Doctor seems to think that the HIV virus is attacking my central nervous system. Even though the bloodworks shows improvement. Can this be so? She states that it can attack body systems and not yet be detected through bloodwork. Can you please explain this ?

Response from Dr. Holodniy

Not exactly sure what she might be speaking of. However, HIV exists in all tissues including the brain and spinal fluid. HIV drugs penetrate into the brain at different levels. In general when we see viral loads go down in the blood, the same finding is seen in the spinal fluid. However, that is an indirect measure of what is going on in the brain. The virus can cause an inflammatory response within the brain. It is conceivable, although difficult to prove, that there might be a discordant treatment response between the blood and brain. MH