For neonates with HIV, early treatment followed by a drug holiday yielded better results than deferring treatment until it was medically necessary, researchers reported.
In a randomized, open-label study, children in the programmed therapy interruption arms were significantly less likely to die or to have treatment failure than those on deferred therapy, according to Mark Cotton, MD, PhD, of Stellenbosch University in Tygerberg, South Africa.
They were also significantly less likely to have HIV disease progression, Cotton and colleagues reported online in The Lancet.
The so-called CHER (children with HIV early antiretroviral) trial enrolled infants with HIV but without symptoms and randomly assigned them to deferred treatment or to therapy for either 40 or 96 weeks, after which it would be stopped until starting again became medically necessary.
Michael Smith
MedPage Today
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