Glossary

resistance – when the genetic structure of an organism (virus, bacteria, fungi etc) changes in a way that stops a drug from working. See mutation.

Changing treatment and drug resistance.

malignant – dangerous. A malignant cancer is a dangerous cancer that is growing.

elite controller (EC) – if your viral load stays undetectable for more than five years without ART you are an elite controller.

Elite controllers also have a very good CD4 count (always above 500 cells/mm³) that stays at a similar level over many years.

Even with this good immune response, ART is still generally recommended in the long-term.

This is because over decades – some ECs have been undetectable for more than 20 years – there is a concern that low level HIV in different body compartments like the brain, might lead to accumulative serious damage that isn’t easy to detect until it is too late.

This is a real concern, though evidence is limited because of the rarity of ECs.

See: long-term slow progressor (LTSP)/long-term non-progessor (LTNP).

interaction – when two drugs react to increase or decrease one or both drugs, often in ways that are unexpected or potentially harmful.

null hypothesis – in a study this sometimes just refers to the hypothesis, but more specifically it refers the idea that any difference between 2 study groups has only occurred by chance.