Question
Does treatment work if you start with a low CD4 count?
5 January 2010. Related: All topics, CD4 and viral load, Living with HIV long-term, Starting treatment.
Hello
Can a person with a very low CD4 cells count below 200 recover his health by taking treatment and live more than a decade?
Thank you.
Answer
Hi
Thanks for your question.
Treatment will work at any CD4 count.
However the lower it goes below 200, then greater the risk that something serious might happen before this. If your count is already low and you have been lucky so far, then starting now is important. If your count is still above 200 now, then starting before it drops below 200 is important.
Most current guidelines recommend starting when the CD4 count is around 350, if you have access to newer medication that doesn’t require using d4T (stavudine) or AZT (zidovudine).
The main limitation from starting with a low CD4 count is that this will limit how high your CD4 count can recover.
A recent study provided some guidelines as to what this mean in practice. We also reported this research in HTB.
CD4 increases strongly correlated with CD4 count when they started treatment.
For example, the following percentages of people reached a CD4 count over 500:
Hi Troy, please talk to your doctor about starting treatment anyway. Most clinics in the UK would do this while they wait for the results. Your CD4 count is still pretty strong and this will increase after you start treatment. This will also sort out your oral thrush better than the Nystatin. Can I ask which country you are in?