Hello and welcome to the Zero to Finals podcast. My name is Tom, and in this episode, I'm going to be talking to you about pediatric HIV.

And if you want to follow along with written notes on this topic, you can follow along at zero definals.com slash HIV, or in the infectious diseases section of the Zero Definals Pediatrics book.

So let's get straight into it.

HIV refers to the human immunodeficiency virus.

Infection with this virus makes a person HIV positive.

AIDS refers to the acquired immunodeficiency syndrome that occurs at the end

stages of a HIV infection, once the affection has affected the immune system enough to make a person

susceptible to recurrent or unusual infections. AIDS is usually referred to in the UK as late stage HIV. Let's start with some basic

pathophysiology. HIV is an RNA retrovirus. HIV 1 is the most common type and HIV 2 is where

outside West Africa.

The virus enters and destroys the CD4T helper cells of the immune system.

Patients experience a seroconversion, flu-like illness,

which occurs within a few weeks of the initial infection.

The infection is then asymptomatic until it progresses and the patient becomes immunocompromised and begins developing AIDS-defining illnesses and opportunistic

infections, which potentially could be years later. Let's talk about transmission. HIV cannot be spread through normal day-to-day activities, including kissing.

It's spread through unprotected anal, vaginal or oral sexual activity,

from mother to child at any stage of pregnancy, birth or breastfeeding,

and this is referred to as vertical transmission, and also through mucus membrane, breastfeeding, and this is referred to as vertical transmission,

and also through mucus membrane, blood or open wound exposure to infected blood or bodily fluids.

This could be through sharing needles, needle stick injuries or splashes of blood in an eye.

Next let's talk about preventing transmission during birth.

The mode of delivery will be determined by the mother's viral load of the virus.

...