Antiretroviral drug combination of Tenofovir-Emtricitabine-Efavirenz found to be better in treating AIDS with lesser side effects.
Professor Joel Gallant and his team from Johns Hopkins University School of Medicine as reported in the Journal The New England Journal of Medicine that Antiretroviral combination drug of Tenofovir, Emtricitabine and Efavirenz is found to be effective in controlling HIV load compared to most widely used drug combination Zidovudine, Lamivudine and Efavirenz.
The clinical trial called ‘study 934’ was conducted in 517 HIV patients from U.S. and European countries, one group of patients received the combination of tenofovir-emtricitabine-efavirenz (TEE) and the second group was given the combination of zidovudine-lamivudine-efavirenz (ZLE). The researchers found that after the first year of treatment the TEE group patients showed a comparatively reduced viral load of about 80% with increased concentration of CD4 immune cells which boost the immune response against the virus compared to the ZLE group where there was only a reduction of 70% with increase in CD4 counts but less than the counts in TEE group.Researchers found that patients undergoing TEE drug combination had very less side effects during the drug regimen compared to ZLE group who experienced side effects such as Lipoatrophy (Loss of fat leading to complete change in body shape), anemia, nausea and vomiting.
