HLA antigens as predictors of disease progression in HIV-infected haemophilia patients (a 22 years' follow up).

Our objective was to assess the influence of genetic factors such as HLA classes I and II antigens and other clinical and laboratory variables on the progression of HIV disease in a cohort of 118 HIV infected haemophilic subjects of Greek origin who had been typed for HLA antigens and were followed up prospectively for 22 years since seroconversion. At the end of the follow up we compared two groups of patients: 22 patients who had a fast progression to AIDS (median 6 years since seroconversion) vs. 33 patients who remained asymptomatic in stage A2 for up to 22 years (median 15 years). The results showed that the two groups did not differ significantly in age at seroconversion or baseline CD4+ T cell count. However there was a difference in the frequencies of certain HLA antigens in the two groups. The fast progressors had a higher frequency of HLA-A28, B21 and DR3, which was statistically significant (P = 0.02, 0.04, 0.05, respectively) compared to the slow progressors. These findings based on classical HLA typing techniques confirm other published observations and support the effect of genetic background in the progression of HIV infection in haemophilics.