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Copyright of Medicina (Buenos Aires) is the property of Medicina (Buenos Aires) and its content may not be copied or emailed to multiple sites or posted to a listserv without the copyright holder's express written permission. However, users may print, download, or email articles for individual use. This abstract may be abridged. No warranty is given about the accuracy of the copy. Users should refer to the original published version of the material for the full abstract. (Copyright applies to all Abstracts.)

Copyright of Medicina (Buenos Aires) is the property of Medicina (Buenos Aires) and its content may not be copied or emailed to multiple sites or posted to a listserv without the copyright holder's express written permission. However, users may print, download, or email articles for individual use. This abstract may be abridged. No warranty is given about the accuracy of the copy. Users should refer to the original published version of the material for the full abstract. (Copyright applies to all Abstracts.)

Copyright of Medicina (Buenos Aires) is the property of Medicina (Buenos Aires) and its content may not be copied or emailed to multiple sites or posted to a listserv without the copyright holder's express written permission. However, users may print, download, or email articles for individual use. This abstract may be abridged. No warranty is given about the accuracy of the copy. Users should refer to the original published version of the material for the full abstract. (Copyright applies to all Abstracts.)

Copyright of Medicina (Buenos Aires) is the property of Medicina (Buenos Aires) and its content may not be copied or emailed to multiple sites or posted to a listserv without the copyright holder's express written permission. However, users may print, download, or email articles for individual use. This abstract may be abridged. No warranty is given about the accuracy of the copy. Users should refer to the original published version of the material for the full abstract. (Copyright applies to all Abstracts.)

Introduction: Combined prevention (CP) is considered the key strategy against the HIV epidemic. The objective of the study was to evaluate the perception of risk of HIV infection and the knowledge about the use of antiretrovirals (ARV) for prevention, among patients who attend a Sexually Transmitted Infections (STI) clinic., Methods: A survey on personal data and perception of risk of HIV infection, knowledge about post-exposure prophylaxis (PEP) and pre-exposure prophylaxis (PrEP), was administered to patients at the time of applying doses of penicillin for the treatment of syphilis, or when taking a blood sample for STI diagnosis, between May and December, 2022., Results: 100 persons were surveyed: 43 were under 25 years of age, 67 reported male sex-gender and 33 females. Thirty of 91 (33%) perceived they had had some risk of infection in their lives, 19 of them in the last year; 77/96 (80%) stated that they had no knowledge about PEP, and 82/100, about PrEP. Only 22 out of 100 responded that antiretrovirals could provide benefit in preventing HIV; 26 (60%) of the 43 patients <25 years of age, and 18 of the 57 ≥ 25 years (31.6%) responded they have had two or more sexual partners in the last year. No statistically significant differences were observed related to gender and age group., Discussion: The low perception of infection risk and knowledge about the use of antiretrovirals in HIV prevention, show the existing difficulties for the implementation of combined prevention (PEP-PrEP) in this population.

Hepatitis C virus (HCV) infection is currently the main blood-borne viral infection. One of the main obstacles to achieving its control in Argentina is related to difficulties in accessing the diagnosis and timely treatment of infected people. We carried out this study with the aim of characterizing the HCV-infected patients who started treatment with direct-acting antivirals (DAAs) and to describe the experience related to treatment. The medical records of 82 patients, 44 (53.7%) male, 37 (45.1%) female, and one (1.2%) transgender, were selected. The mean age was 49 years. We report a frequency of cirrhosis, 39%, in 32 patients, coinfection with HIV in 48 (58.5%) and with HBV in 27 (32.9%). In 52 patients (63.4%), no risk factor clearly associated with infection was observed. All completed the therapy, of them 72 (87.8%) carried out the control to confirm sustained viral response (SVR), that attained 98.6%. We conclude that universal testing should be implemented over testing based on a risk approach, and that a simplified and decentralized care criterion should be promoted, reserving specialized care for patients with decompensated cirrhosis and liver cancer.

Pregnancy and postpartum control in HIV infected women. We present data from a retrospective observational descriptive study with the objective of evaluating characteristics of HIV-infected pregnant women, analyze the level of control of pregnancy and assess adherence to treatment and loss of follow up after delivery. We analyzed reported data of 104 pregnancies, 32.7% of them under 25 years old. The diagnosis was performed as part of pregnancy control in 36.5% of women. TARV started before 24 weeks of pregnancy in 70% of them and a regimen with 2 nucleos(t)ides and 1 ritonavir potenciated protease inhibitor (PIr) was prescribed in 84.5%. Elective c-section was the most frequent mode of delivery. The viral load after 32 weeks of pregnancy was available in 82.7%, being less than 1000 cop/ml in 78 (75%), less than 200 cop/ml in 70 (67.3%) and not available in 18 (17.3%) of cases. We observed a considered high rate of adherence failure and loss of follow up after delivery. Reported data should alert programs on the need to implement strategies to promote early pregnancy control and increase adherence and retention in care, especially in the postpartum period.

In order to evaluate the frequency of a late clinical stage in HIV infected patients at onset of antiretroviral therapy (LART) and to identify possible associated factors, we performed a retrospective analysis of data reported in two prospective cohorts of HIV infected patients who started antiretroviral therapy for the first time between 2005 and 2009. Medical records of 265 patients -123 women (46.6%) and 141 men, median age 37.7 years old- were analyzed. LART was observed in 132 cases (50%), out of them 102 (77.2%) were associated to late diagnosis of HIV infection and 30 (22.8%) to patients that had not been retained in HIV care. The median of CD4 was 120 cells/ml and that of viral load 58 038 copies/ml. CD4 cells count was below 200 cells/ml in 174 patients (71.3%). There was a higher incidence of LART in men than in women (59.8% and 42.2% respectively). Diagnosis in women took place during pregnancy control in 25:2% of the cases. High alcohol consumption (p 0.006), single hood (p 0.04) and level of education lower than secondary (p 0.008) were associated to LART at bivariate analysis. Male sex (p 0.003) was the only associated factor both in bivariate and multivariate analysis. Our data reinforce the need of expanding HIV testing and should assist programs to define actions promoting early entry in HIV care.