Long drug holidays may not be such a great idea, though, according to at least one study. And long viral load suppression is not everything, either. Read on!

Dr. Andrew N. Phillips from the Royal Free and University College Medical School, London and colleagues followed 336 antiretroviral-naive HIV-infected patients who achieved viral loads of less than 50 copies/mL within 24 weeks of beginning highly active antiretroviral therapy (HAART).

During 3.3 years (543.1 person years) of follow-up, 61 patients had a viral rebound. But, 47 of those subjects had interrupted treatment, mostly due to comorbidities, the researchers report in the December 2001 issue of AIDS.

The other 14 patients who had a viral rebound despite continuous HAART, appear to represent the true group in which HAART failed, for a risk of viral rebound over 3.3 years of 5.2%, Dr. Phillips's group notes. Also, the longer the viral load remained suppressed the more the risk of viral breakthrough decreased (p = 0.01), according to the investigators.

"Our findings are important because they indicate that, when used in drug-naive individuals and if suppression to viral loads of less than 50 copies/mL is initially achieved, these regimens only rarely actually fail to maintain virological suppression, so long as they are taken," Dr. Phillips and colleagues say.

(Dr. Andrew N. Phillips [2001], AIDS 15:379-2384.)

Reported by Reuters Medical News.