First diagnosis Results and confused

[nethan1621]

After one year of hard times, finally feeling stabilized in positive life…

I recalled my first result one year ago and there are few questions would like to ask  if you can give me some kind of answers or ideas

- i have seen many of us diagnosed with high viral load ( millions)  but not all.
- i have read viral load and cd4 count stabilized ( low viral load , good cd4 count )  few  years from the time of infection ( untreated ) until it goes to next level , AIDS.

Question:
My first diagnosis results 11800 viral load 718 cd4 count HIV 1

Can we assume that i was infected within 6 months ( assuming from a friend of mine i met ) ? But still acute infection time normally viral load is high but mine was low. Can it be low viral load even at the time of acute infection?

Or  was i infected long time go and without symptoms , and my viral load went down by the time being while body was fighting against the virus and cd4 count raised to stabilized level while progressing to AIDS ? 1-10 years )

How can i have low viral load and normal cd4 count at acute infection time ? ( within 6 months)

Or did i live with the virus for a long time until it goes to low viral count and cd4 counts comes to a normal level ?

[Jim Allen]

Hiya,

From VL & CD4 counts, nobody can say how long you lived with HIV, and your results could easily be 6 to 12 months or even six years.

- i have read viral load and cd4 count stabilized ( low viral load , good cd4 count )  few  years from the time of infection ( untreated ) until it goes to next level , AIDS.

Yes, and below and for example purposes only, I've included a graph illustrating the average progression timeline. Although, some people will progress slower and others faster than the example and this graph oversimplifies things and doesn't account for the damage untreated HIV can do before reaching the AIDS stage. 

.

- i have seen many of us diagnosed with high viral load ( millions)  but not all.

I don't know about the rest of the world, but one of the challenges within the west EU region at least is the late diagnosis of HIV.  49% are diagnosed late with 30% of that group diagnosed very late.

Ref:
https://www.ecdc.europa.eu/sites/default/files/documents/2021-Annual_HIV_Report_0.pdf

After one year of hard times, finally feeling stabilized in positive life…

Glad to hear you feel things are stable.

Is there something about the amount of time you could have been living with HIV  unbeknownst to yourself bothering you?

[nethan1621]

Is there something about the amount of time you could have been living with HIV  unbeknownst to yourself bothering you?

Thanks Jim,

Nothing that too much bothering, i was just exploring about this. Meanwhile was thinking how big could be the latent virus reservoir inside the body when it comes to untreated hiv for many years ( just for the knowledge, and its not important anymore for me , cant do time traveling to correct mistakes 😁 im eating my sweet brown tablet daily and kick the day )

[Jim Allen]

Thanks, Jim,

Nothing that too much bothering, i was just exploring about this. Meanwhile was thinking how big could be the latent virus reservoir inside the body when it comes to untreated hiv for many years ( just for the knowledge, and its not important anymore for me , cant do time traveling to correct mistakes 😁 im eating my sweet brown tablet daily and kick the day )

You're welcome.

Glad it's not something that is keeping you up at night, and as you correctly point out, we can't time travel, and there isn't anything we can do about the reservoir at this point, so it is what it is.

I know in some studies, the qVOA assay was used to monitor the reservoir, and I just googled to double-check and found an article indicating the same. Although I believe the drawbacks are the high cost and volume of blood needed, I am open to correction.

https://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/S2352396418303943