Treatments for Wasting in Patients with the Acquired Immunodeficiency Syndrome

Wasting was an early identifying characteristic of human immunodeficiency virus (HIV) infection, originally termed “slim disease” in Africa.1 As defined by the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC), wasting in patients with the acquired immunodeficiency syndrome (AIDS) is the involuntary loss of more than 10 percent of base-line body weight in combination with diarrhea, weakness, or fever.2 Wasting is considered an AIDS-defining condition. However, there is considerable controversy about the appropriate definition of AIDS wasting (whether it should be defined as the loss of 5 or 10 percent of usual weight) and whether changes in body composition, rather than . . .