During the last several years, our understanding of how HIV infects the body has grown tremendously. With this knowledge we have been able to create various drugs to help treat this infection. HIV medications may keep you from getting minor symptoms early in the disease. They may also prevent or delay the damage that would make you prone to serious illnesses and symptoms.
Starting any HIV treatment - whether it's your first time or whether you're switching drugs is a big decision to make. In order for you to get the most out of your medication (so they may help improve the quality of your life) it is important for you to take an active role in your therapy. You can do this in several ways.
1. Know your treatment options
There are several different medications available to treat HIV infection. They are grouped into three main categories:
Nucleoside reverse transcriptase inhibitors
Non-nucleoside reverse transcriptase inhibitors
Protease inhibitors
Knowing which medications you have been previously treated with (if any), which side-effects you experienced and what other medical conditions/allergies you have, will help you and your health care provider decide the best combination of drugs to treat your infection. Keeping a medication diary may help in this regard.
2. Plan for the long run
In choosing medicines to help you stay as healthy as possible for as long as possible, you and your doctor will need to consider not only the best medicines for you right now, but also which drugs are best for your "backup plan".
3. Know the rules of your medication
Every drug has its own "rules" for how to take it. Some medicines must be taken exactly on time, while others are not as strict. Some drugs are weakened when mixed with food and are recommended to be taken on an empty stomach. Other medications work better if taken with food. Finally, some medicines are not affected by food and can be taken either way.
For the medicine to work know ...
When to take it
Whether to take it with or without food
How many pills to take
What to do if you miss a dose
4. Be aware of side effects
Although medications are designed to help treat your illness, they may cause side effects. Some side effects are temporary and resolve on their own, while others are serious and need immediate attention. It is important for you to learn about the side effects that are common to your medicine. This way you can monitor yourself and report them to your health care provider, and together you can decide on the best way to manage them. It is important that you do not stop or decrease the dose of your medicine on your own OR self treat your side effects .
5. Use caution when mixing medications
Some medications when taken together can cause harmful effects (e.g. protease inhibitors when taken with terfenadine or astemizole -- both are antihistamines -- may cause irregular heartbeats). To avoid potential complications from drug interactions be sure to tell your doctor and health care providers all the medicines you are taking, including prescription drugs, over-the-counter medications (drugs you can buy without a prescription), street drugs and herbs/vitamins. Your doctor can then advise you on which drugs are safe to take together and which ones should be avoided.
6. Track your progress
To determine how well the medications are fighting your HIV infection, your doctor may order two types of blood tests:
Viral load testing: shows the amount of HIV in your blood
CD4 cell count (or T-cells): shows the number of disease fighting cells in your blood
To understand how these two tests determine your progress, think of yourself as a train traveling on tracks with the bridge out ahead. The length of the track is similar to the level of CD4 cells. The higher the CD4 cell count, the longer the track. The speed of the train is similar to the viral load. The higher the viral load, the faster the train is moving toward the missing bridge. Therefore, the goal is to increase the tracks or CD4 cell count and slow the speed of the train by lowering the viral load with drug treatment. By tracking your progress, you can identify where you are on the train tracks. The CD4 cell count will also inform your doctor when to start certain antibiotics to prevent other infections.
By following the above points, you will be able to take full advantage of your drug therapy and possibly avoid or be able to manage complications. The remainder of this section describes in more detail the various drugs used to manage HIV, opportunistic infections and other illnesses related to the disease.
