Seroprevalence of cytomegalovirus among human immunodeficiency virus (HIV) postiev patients attending HAART clinic in Kawar State, north-central Nigeria

Abstract

Background: Cytomegalovirus (CMV) infection is usually acquired early in life resulting in an asymptomatic, subclinical, and mostly latent infection in immune-competent persons. Infections could be acquired during infancy with asymptomatic and undetectable infections in immune-competent persons. Cytomegalovirus infection has been documented to be prevalent among human immunodeficiency virus (HIV)-infected persons. This study was conducted to determine the seroprevalence of CMV among HIV positive patients as well as to determine the risk factors associated with the transmission of the disease. Methods: This study is a cross-sectional and epidemiological survey involving 400 HIV positive patients attending Highly Active Antiretroviral Therapy (HAART) clinic at Ilorin and Offa general hospital, Kwara State, North-Central Nigeria. 5 ml of serum was aseptically collected from the consented participants while Enzyme Linked Immunosorbent Assay (ELISA) kit (Biogenix, india) was used for the detection of CMV specific IgG antibodies. The test procedures were followed strictly according to the manufacturer instructions. Result: The results obtained showed that 368 samples out of the 400 samples screened for CMV were positive, which depicted a prevalence of 92% while 32(8.0%) were negative. Out of which, 270(73.4%) were females and 98(26.6%) were males. statistically, this research showed that there was a significant association between blood transfusion and CMV infection which may be suggestive that having blood transfusion could be a potential risk factor for CMV transmission (p =0.037), while there were no statistical relationship between the prevalence of CMV and some demographic characteristics such as age (p =0.71), gender (p = 0.748), educational Status (p = 0.104), occupation (p = 0.846), marital Status (p = 0.509), viral Loads (p =0.285), sexual activity (p = 0.314), and immunosuppression (p = 0.644). Conclusion: The high prevalence of CMV (92.0%) among the studied population is a clear indication that a vast majority of HIV seropositive individuals in Kwara State are at risk of contracting CMV infection and as such, more preventive measures should be employed to mitigate the menace of CMV infection among HIV positive patients.

Keywords

• seroprevalence
• cytomegalovirus
• hiv
• haart
• kwara- north central nigeria