Additional CVD mortality risk due to the duration of HIV infection and ART was seen in our population, further studies in larger and more representative study samples are encouraged. Like uninfected individuals, our study found increased age as a major predictor of 10-year mortality risk and high prevalence of metabolic syndrome. However, there was no association between these factors and categorised CVD mortality risk as per recommended scoring thresholds.ConclusionsApproximately 1 in 10 HIV-infected patients is at very high risk of predicted 10-year CVD mortality in our study population.

Adjusting for age and analysing CVD risk mortality as a continuous risk score, increasing duration of HIV infection (p = 0.002) and ART (p = 0.007) were significantly associated with increased predicted 10 year CVD mortality risk. The CVD risk grows with increasing age (years), 57.82 ± 6.27 among very high risk and 37.52 ± 4.50 p < 0.001 in very low risk patients. 52% (95% CI 44–60) of the patients were stratified to very low risk ( 30%) of 10-year CVD mortality. A total of 144 patients with complete data allowed a definitive prediction of a 10-year CVD mortality risk. A validated non-laboratory-based model for predicting a 10-year CVD mortality risk was applied and categorised into five levels, with the thresholds ranging from very low-risk ( 30%).ResultsAmong the 384 patients, with a mean (± standard deviation) age of 42.90 ± 8.20 years, the proportion of patients that were overweight/obese was 53.3%, where 50.9% had low high-density lipoprotein (HDL) cholesterol and 21 (17.5%) had metabolic syndrome. We defined metabolic syndrome (MetS) subcomponents using the International Diabetes Federation definition.

We predicted a 10-year cardiovascular mortality risk in an HIV-infected population on long-term ART, based on their observed metabolic risk factor profile.MethodsWe extracted data from hospital medical charts for 384 randomly selected HIV-infected patients aged ≥ 30 years. However, this population may be susceptible to cardiovascular disease (CVD) development, due to the chronic consequences of a lifestyle-related combination of risk factors, HIV infection and ART. BackgroundSouth Africa has the largest population of human immunodeficiency virus (HIV) infected patients on antiretroviral therapy (ART) realising the benefits of increased life expectancy.

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