BIOL 301 Lecture Notes - Lecture 12: Pneumocystis Pneumonia, Mycobacterium Avium-Intracellulare Infection, Mycobacterium Tuberculosis
17 Oct 2018
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Document Summary
Opportunistic infections of hiv/aids: pathogens that do not normally cause disease in humans with an intact immune system can cause disease in humans with an altered/depressed immune system, hiv results in deficiency in immune system. The infections these organisms cause are opportunistic infections (ois: ois occur with infectious agents that normally do not cause disease, but take the opportunity that a host is immunocompromised to establish an infection. Used to be rare and now have increased in frequency in recent years. In the past, only occurred in individuals whose immunity was impaired by cancer or genetic disease: medical treatments result in suppressed immune systems. Organ and tissue transplantation, cancer chemotherapy/radiation, elderly, hiv infections and resulting immune deficiency: various anti-hiv drug therapies show promise in treatment of opportunistic infections by boosting the immune system of patients. Treatments have reduced the number of cases of certain opportunistic infections.
