Cytomegalovirus esophagitis in patients with AIDS. A clinical, endoscopic, and pathologic correlation.

Objective: To examine the clinical presentation, endoscopic features, laboratory diagnosis, and outcome of cytomegalovirus esophagitis in patients with the acquired immunodeficiency syndrome (AIDS).

Design: Retrospective review of endoscopy records and esophageal biopsy material from patients with AIDS during the 24-month period from 1986 to 1988.

Setting: Urban medical center, central receiving county hospital.

Detection of HIV in enterochromaffin cells in the rectal mucosa of an AIDS patient.

The human immunodeficiency virus (HIV) was detected by in situ hybridization in the bowel crypt and lamina propria in the rectal mucosa of an acquired immune deficiency syndrome (AIDS) patient. More infected cells were noted in the crypts than the lamina propria. The enterochromaffin cell was one cell type showing the presence of virus.

Human immunodeficiency virus detected in bowel epithelium from patients with gastrointestinal symptoms.

Infectious human immunodeficiency virus (HIV) was recovered from two out of four bowel biopsy specimens from acquired immunodeficiency syndrome (AIDS) patients with chronic diarrhoea of unknown aetiology. In-situ hybridisation of biopsy specimens from rectum and duodenum of other AIDS patients with gastrointestinal complaints showed the presence of HIV-infected cells in both the base of the bowel crypts and the lamina propria. The type(s) of epithelial cell(s) infected could not be determined definitively.

Hepatic disease in patients with the acquired immune deficiency syndrome (AIDS).

The spectrum of liver disease in patients with acquired immune deficiency syndrome (AIDS) and the clinical impact of diagnostic percutaneous liver biopsy in this population were evaluated by a retrospective review of hepatic histology, clinical features and laboratory data in 85 patients (26 biopsies, 59 autopsies). Only 1 (3.8%) biopsy and 9 (15%) postmortem livers were histologically normal.