Encephalitis human immunodeficiency virus, a case report and review

Abstract

In this paper we describe the case of a patient with histological diagnosis of human immunodeficiency virus (HIV) encephalitis, which also had multiple co-infections. It is a striking case, because of the incidence of this disease has markedly decreased in the post Highly Active Antiretroviral Therapy HAART era. The patient was a heterosexual male of 63 years old engaged in risky sexual behavior, who was admitted to a reference hospital with respiratory symptoms. During hospitalization He was diagnosed with stage C3 HIV/AIDS, multiple infections such as Hepatitis B, Neurosyphilis, systemic cryptococcosis, cerebral toxoplasmosis, cutaneous histoplasmosis, oral herpes and candida infections; He received appropriate treatments for all of the above, however He died 27 days later by disseminated cryptococcosis. He underwent autopsy and in central nervous system in the white matter were observed numerous microglial nodules, perivascular lymphocytes and multinucleated giant cells without granuloma formation. These giant cells are characteristics of HIV encephalitis. This patient is an example of the natural history of HIV infection that progressed to an advanced stage of AIDS.