[Cerebral glioblastoma: a new complication of HIV-1 infection]

A new case of supratentorial malignant glioma is reported in an HIV-1 infected male homosexual. Tumours of the nervous system account for only 5 to 10 percent of neurological complications of AIDS, and most of them are lymphomas or metastases from Kaposi's sarcomas. In fact, HIV-1 is a neurotropic lentivirus, not transforming by definition. Our patient had a frontal tumoral syndrome resistant to the conventional anti-toxoplasmic treatment. Pathological examination of a tumoral fragment obtained by stereotactic biopsy showed that according to the WHO criteria the tumour was a glioblastoma. The mechanism through which HIV infection results in malignant transformation of astrocytes is conjectural. There is no consensus on whether the virus is located in glial cells, but the transgenic animal technique suggests that the tat gene might play a certain role. Other hypotheses concerning the indirect neurotoxicity of HIV have been put forward, notably that of viral coinfection with viruses of the papova group.