[Gastrointestinal diseases associated with HIV infection]

A clinical studies were carried out on gastrointestinal diseases associated with HIV infection. During the 6 years between January 1993 and December 1998, 71 HIV infected cases visited to Yokohama Municipal Citizen's hospital, and 26 of them developed gastrointestinal complications during the course of their illness. They consisted of 24 males and 2 females, with the mean age of 44.7 years and the medial value of 42.5 years. Of the 26 patients, 21 were Japanese, and the remaining 5 were Southeast Asian. The mean CD4 count was 143/microliter and the medial value was 32/microliter at the time of development of complications. Gastrointestinal complications were esophageal candidiasis in 6 patients, cytomegalovirus (CMV) gastritis and gastric Kaposi's sarcoma in 1 patient each, amebiasis in 8 patients, infectious colitis in 11 patients, and asymptomatic pathogen carriers in 3 patients. Esophageal and gastric complications were common in patients with low count of CD4, and endoscopy was useful for diagnosis. Amebiasis developed even in patients with normal CD4 and was common in males with experience in homosexual contact. It seems that homosexual contact acquire not only HIV infection but also Entamoeba histolytica through sexual contact. Protozoan and acid-fast bacteria were detected at high rate in patients with infectious colitis and asymptomatic pathogen carriers. Besides food-born infections, imported infections were seen in foreign and Japanese patients who had traveled abroad. The gastrointestinal diseases associated with HIV infections for the most part were opportunistic infections or tumors but imported, food-born, and sexually transmitted infections were also observed. It seems necessary to take into consideration of varying background of patients in the treatment of gastrointestinal diseases associated with HIV infections.