It is Not Always COVID-19: Case Report about an Undiagnosed HIV Man with Dyspnea

Title:It is Not Always COVID-19: Case Report about an Undiagnosed HIV Man with Dyspnea

Volume: 19 Issue: 6

Author(s): Michela Pontolillo, Katia Falasca*, Jacopo Vecchiet and Claudio Ucciferri

Affiliation:

• Clinic of Infectious Diseases, G. d’Annunzio” University Chieti-Pescara,Italy

Keywords: COVID-19, HIV, CMV pneumonia, respiratory failure, SARScoV2, swab.

Abstract:

Background: The current COVID-19 pandemic has attracted great attention from the medical world. In the past year, there have been reports of missed or delayed treatments for conditions that mimic COVID-19. The main symptoms caused by SARS-CoV-2, such as fever and cough, belong to different clinical conditions. It is of the utmost importance that the diagnostic thinking used to analyze data and information to reach a COVID-19 diagnosis does not overlook the plethora of different diagnoses related to these symptoms.

Case Report: The aim of this work is to present the clinical case of a patient having unrecognized HIV infection with a 4-week history of fever, cough, and hypoxia. When tests were allowed to highlight HIV-related immunodeficiency status, a CMV assay was performed in order to evaluate opportunistic pneumonia. Through this, diagnosis of HIV combined with CMV pneumonia was made, thus excluding COVID-19 respiratory insufficiency.

Conclusion: The diagnosis of the two conditions in the COVID-19 era is challenging due to overlapping clinical and radiological features and limitations of current diagnostic assays. This causes clinical implications due to diagnostic delays.

Cite this article as:

Pontolillo Michela, Falasca Katia*, Vecchiet Jacopo and Ucciferri Claudio, It is Not Always COVID-19: Case Report about an Undiagnosed HIV Man with Dyspnea, Current HIV Research 2021; 19 (6) . https://dx.doi.org/10.2174/1570162X19666210901134104