[Non-AIDS-defining malignancies in HIV patients: clinical features and perspectives]

Abstract

Eventhough the advent of highly active antiretroviral therapy (HAART) has dramatically improved patient outcome and provided a significant shrinking of the cases and severity of opportunistic infections, AIDS malignancies have become responsible of a new vexing challenge in HIV patient care and cure. Indeed, malignant tumors currently rank among the leading cause of morbidity and mortality in patients infected with HIV. In addition to the AIDS-malignancies, non-AIDS defining tumors have a higher incidence than the general population such as Hodgkin disease, lung cancer, cutaneaous cancer and anal cancer. These malignant tumors are generally characterized by a more aggressive behaviour at diagnosis and a poorer outcome compared with the same tumors in the general population. Although recent therapeutic advances have been made in chemotherapy, combinations with antiretroviral agents, for many of these malignancies the pronostic remains poor and there is a deeply lack of current therapeutic guidelines for these cancer patients care and cure. These recommendations might be the fruit of a new networking between HIV specialists and oncologists and of an improving knowledge of the pathogenesis and clinical features of these AIDS non-defining tumors.