Cytomegalovirus retinitis in HIV patients attending Eye/Uveitis clinic in Korle-Bu Teaching Hospital, Accra -Ghana

Abstract

Cytomegalovirus (CMV) retinitis is an ocular manifestation of human immunodeficiency virus (HIV) infection especially in individual with low CD4 cells count. In Ghana, a country where CMV infection is hyperendemic, there is no data of CMV retinitis among HIV positive persons. This work was conducted to evaluate the prevalence of CMV retinitis among HIV positive persons attending eye clinic in Korle-Bu Teaching Hospital. Eye swab and vitreous samples were collected from HIV positive patients with retinal inflammation. The samples were assayed for DNA of Herpes Simplex Virus, Varicella Zoster, Cytomegalovirus and Epstein - Barr virus by using qualitative polymerase chain reaction (PCR) (multiplex PCR) to detect the presence or absence of herpes viruses. Sixty-two patients had retinal inflammation from ophthalmoscopy out of the total 404 that came into the clinic during the study period from July, 2010 to April, 2011. Forty six of these were HIV positive. Only 3 (6.5%) HIV positive patients had their swab or vitreous humour samples yielding DNA of CMV virus. These patients had their CD4 cell counts above 25 cells/µl. This is the first study to show the prevalence of CMV retinitis among HIV patients in Korle-Bu Teaching Hospital, Ghana. It is necessary for more comprehensive longitudinal study to evaluate incidence and cumulative risk of CMV retinitis among HIV positive individual. Key words: Cytomegalovirus, human immunodeficiency virus, Ghana, Korle-Bu, retinitis, CD4, ophthalmoscopy.