The introduction of highly active antiretroviral therapy prolonged the life span of PLWHIV and therefore; they live longer and develop chronic diseases, which are associated with ageing related Non-Communicable Diseases. The study aimed to assess the prevalence of non-communicable diseases and associated risk factors among people living with HIV infection at a Tertiary Hospital of Rwanda. A cross-sectional study was conducted to PLWHIV followed at the ambulatory HIV clinic of Kigali University Teaching hospital (CHUK) from August 2019 to Feb 2020, A systematic random sampling approach was used to select participants from the clinic registry. Social-demographic data, psychometric and clinical data were collected using structured questionnaire. Anthropometric and biochemical measurements were performed and results were recorded using Epidata and exported to SPSS for analysis. Logistic regression analysis was used to explore associated risk factors. A total of 222 participants were enrolled from a cohort of 2580 PLWH in care. The overall prevalence of NCDs was 36%. The most common condition was hypertension 22.5%), Diabetes mellitus 9.9%, renal impairment 9.9%, and dyslipidemia 3.2%. Among these NCDs, a high proportion were newly identified cases: 80% for hypertension, 41% for diabetes, and 54% for renal impairment. The most frequent comorbidities were hypertension with renal impairment (35% of comorbid cases), and hypertension with diabetes (30%). Factors independently associated with NCDs included Age above 65years AOR: 8.3;95%CI:2.3–30, P < 0.001,; physical inactivity AOR:2.1,95%CI:1.1–3.8, P = 0.013; adverse drug reaction 50% AOR:2.2; 95%CI: 1.2–4.1, P = 0.009. Non- communicable diseases are highly prevalent in PLWHIV, with Hypertension, Diabetes, and renal failure being the most common. A substantial proportion of cases remained. Old age, Physical inactivity, and adverse effect to drugs were significant predictors of NCDs in this population. These findings highlight the need of integrating NCDs screening and management within HIV care services.
Turikumwe et al. (Thu,) studied this question.