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Early loss of HIV-infected patients on potent antiretroviral therapy programmes in lower-income countries

Martin WG Brinkhof, François Dabis, Landon Myer, David R Bangsberg, Andrew Boulle, Denis Nash, Mauro Schechter, Christian Laurent, Olivia Keiser, Margaret May, Eduardo Sprinz, Matthias Egger, Xavier Anglaret, for the ART-LINC of IeDEA collaboration

Volume 86, Number 7, July 2008, 559-567

Table 1. Characteristics of the ART programmes that contributed data to the analysis

Region and programme name Country Number ofpatientsstarting ARTby 2004a Number of patients eligible for analysis Median CD4-cell count(cells/µl) Freeaccess to treatment Tracing method for patientslost tofollow-up Status 6 months afterthe start of ART
Nofollow-up
Initially followed up, then lost
Knownto have died
(n) (%)b (n) (%)b (n) (%)b
Northern Africa
Morocco ART Cohort Morocco 423 (127; 270) 412 108 Yes Phoneor letter 0 0 47 11 15 3.6
Southern Africa
Gaborone Independent Botswana 288 (228; 279) 213 185 No Phoneor letter 1 0.5 10 4.7 2 0.9
Lighthouse Malawi 1520 (0; 732) 1219 56 No None 109 8.9 441 36 36 3.0
CTAC SouthAfrica 313 (275; 307) 305 241 Yes Home visits 0 0 10 3.3 1 0.3
Khayelitsha SouthAfrica 287 (0; 287) 273 45 Yes Home visits 0 0 0 0 34 13
OPERA SouthAfrica 63 (1; 54) 46 87 Yes Phoneor letter 0 0 0 0 0 0
Eastern Africa
Eldoret Kenya 1138 (0; 223) 839 94 Yes Home visits 33 3.9 142 17 6 0.7
Central andwestern Africa
Cotrame ANRS 1203 Côted’Ivoire 137 (43; 128) 123 133 Yes Home visits 0 0 0 0 8 6.5
Nigeria HAART Nigeria 115 (2; 36) 44 213 No Phoneor letter 0 0 0 0 3 6.8
ISAARV Senegal 153 (140; 153) 148 125 Yes Home visits 0 0 6 4.1 6 4.1
HIMS Various 104 (0; 61) 59 142 Yes Phoneor letter 2 3.4 2 3.4 0 0
South America
Rio de Janeiro HIV Brazil 789 (378; 654) 541 166 Yes None 0 0 28 5.2 2 0.4
SobrHIV Brazil 854 (640; 800) 516 161 Yes None 3 0.6 25 4.8 1 0.2
Asia
YRG CARE India 1367 (84; 744) 717 83 No None 63 8.8 169 24 27 3.8
HIV NAT Thailand 100 (76; 85) 36 121 Yes Phoneor letter 0 0 0 0 0 0

Total 7651 (1994; 4813) 5491 211 3.8 880 16 141 2.6

ANRS, Agence Nationale de Recherches sur le Sida et les hépatites virales; ART, antiretroviral therapy; CTAC, Cape Town AIDS Cohort; HAART, highly active antiretroviral therapy; HIMS, Heineken International Medical Services; ISAARV, Senegalese Initiative on Access to Antiretroviral Drugs; NAT, Netherlands–Australia–Thailand Research Collaboration; OPERA, Operational Research on Antiretrovirals; SobrHIV, South Brazil HIV cohort; YRG CARE, YR Gaitonde Centre for AIDS Research and Education.a Values in parentheses are: number of patients starting ART < 2001; number of patients starting ART < 2003.b The percentages given are for the individual programmes.