Hospital protocol for the patient with acquired immunodeficiency syndrome

This article discusses HIV transmission, prevention, and treatment in a hospital milieu. In a review of all the literature, minimal research has been done on correlating the potency of the virus in terms of transmission with the stage of the disease in an HIV-infected patient. It seems logical that the risk of transmission will increase when the HIV patient has the full blown disease. This might reflect the statistic that 5.3% of all the health care workers infected do not have a determinable cause. Yet it has been proven that seroconversion can occur after nonparenteral exposure. This is confirmed by a recent CDC update that reported seven cases of seroconversion from mucous membrane exposure. More extensive study is needed in developing more accurate statistics on the cumulative risk of health care workers in specific fields of medicine and specific patient communities. Because all the questions on AIDS apparently are not even close to being answered, the importance of using universal precautions cannot be overstressed. Unfortunately, research and experience have shown that compliance in adopting universal precautions is remarkably poor. Training and education must begin at the medical school level with reinforcement through yearly workshops. Prevention seems to be the only hope at this time. The physician's inability to test patients for this virus has only been a deterrent in learning about this dreadful epidemic.