Question
I'm positive, on treatment and I'm 5 weeks pregnant…
19 May 2011. Related: All topics, Pregnancy.
Answer
Thank you for your question. This happens to lots of people, many pregnancies are not planned and hopefully this is something that you are excited about.
If you are already on treatment then that is great.
Is your viral load undetectable? Which treatments are you taking?
If your viral load is undetectable this will dramatically protect your baby from the risk of catching HIV.
For a lot more information on Women’s Health, HIV and Pregnancy please follow this link to this online guide.
Hi,
So you two are doing everything you should so that both her and the baby stay healthy. There is no reason to worry about resistance if she keeps takign her meds in the way that she is supposed too. Atripla is an incredibly widely used medication, including in pregnancy. The drugs are no more likely to cause the babay harm than any other HIV medication.
It is common for a woman’s CD4 to drop when she is pregnant. This usually quickly recovers after birth. The drop to 308 may look serious but it is unlikely to show treatment failure. Has she had a recent viral load test? This is a much better way to heck her treatment is working. If it is still udneetcable then the treatment is working. CD4 count is very variable, even for people who are not pregnant. Lots of things can affect it. Even what time of day you test or if you ahve exercised before hand or not. In case you haven’t seen it before this is our guide on HIV and pregnancy.
Hi my wife was diagnosed with HIV and a cd4 of 120. This was 8 months ago, she was forced into an arranged marriage with a 27 year old IV drug user at 16 who died nine months later of TB, this is in Iran were we met, I’m from UK. This man’s family never told her he died of AIDS and for 12 years she was always suffering from fevers and very low platelets, sometimes 50. At six months into our marriage she developed genital warts which caused some stress between us then she went for the test and found out she was positive and of course had had the virus for 12 years. Her viral load was 1.7 million and her skin was blotchy and dry but that’s it two weeks later she was put on generic atripla (viraday) and clotrimoxal. Her cd4 rose first to 220 then at six months to 436 with an undectable viral load. This traumatic episode brought us closer together and now we’re very happy she’s 7 weeks pregnant. But now her latest cd4 test says 308 and I’ve read pregnancy can only make cd4 drop but only by by about 50. We’re very worried about developed resistance and wether the drugs she’s taking can cause the baby any harm after reading conflicting information on the Internet.
She had a general blood test today that showed everything in the normal range, white blood cells, red blood cells and platelets at 270,000 and everything else was in the normal range. But we’re still very worried. Your website has been a great source of information for us and we’re very grateful. Can you help?. We’re very worried about resistance as Iran has a limited amount of drugs I think compared to the west and she was refused a UK visa as I don’t make the required £20,000 per year.