Treatment of infection: Part 2 Flashcards
What is the acronym AIDS mean?
Acquired ImmunoDeficiency syndrome
What is the acronym HIV mean?
Human Immunodeficiency Virus
What does HIV attack?
It is a retrovirus that attacks T4 lymphocytes
What does the loss of lymphocytes cause?
It impairs immune function allowing for opportunistic infections to happen (impairs our ability to fight infection)
What are anti-HIV drugs? (4)
They are:
- reverse transcriptase inhibitors (RTIs)
- protease inhibitors
- HIV entry inhibitors
- integrase inhibitors
What is the main action of the reverse transcriptase inhibitors (RTIs)?
prevent conversion of viral RNA to viral DNA (reverse transcription)
What are the 2 agents of RTIs?
1) nucleoside RTIs
2) non-nucleoside RTIs
What do the nucleoside RTIs do?
act as “false substrate”
What do the non-nucleoside RTIs do?
block active site on reverse transcriptase
Does nucleoside RTIs act direct or indirect?
Indirect
Does non-nucleoside RTIs act direct or indirect?
direct
True/False:
HIV protease is a key enzyme in the final steps of HIV synthesis
True
What do protease inhibitors do?
They mimic viral components and block protease function
What do the HIV entry inhibitors do?
They impair the ability of HIV to fuse with and enter host lymphocytes
What do the integrase inhibitors do?
inhibit HIV integrase, which is an enzyme that splices viral DNA into host cell DNA