Glossary

pharmacokinetics – the study of how drugs are absorbed, metabolised and cleared from the body.

antibiotic – drug used to treat bacterial infections. Sometimes they work against other kinds of infection.

hepatotoxicity – the medical term for liver-related side effects

NRTI – Nucleoside Reverse Transcriptase Inhibitor, a type of HIV drug – also called ‘nuke’ or ‘nucleoside analogue’.

3TC (lamivudine). abacavir, AZT, FTC (emtricitabine), d4T (stavudine), ddI (didanosine) all belong to this class.

Tenofovir DF and tenofovir alafenamide (TAF) are a nucleotide analogues which is similar enough to be counted as part of this class.

Drug targets in the virus life cycle.

sensitivity – when referring to the accuracy of a test result, sensitivity refers to the proportion of people with an illness or disease who have a positive test result.

If a test has low sensitivity, then false-negative results are the concern – where people have a condition but it is missed.

If a test has high sensitivity, then people are accurately diagnosed – and only a few people are missed.

For a serious condition, high sensitivity is essential to be able to identify people early.

Online calculator.

See specificity.

sensitivity – when referring to the activity of a drug, sensitive means that a drug still works. As resistance develops a drug becomes less sensitive.

A complete loss of sensitivity implies that a drug is no longer working.

It also means that your partner may benefit from counselling.