Prevalence of Opportunistic Infections and Associated Factors in HIV-Infected Men Who Have Sex With Men on Antiretroviral Therapy in Bach Mai Hospital, Hanoi, Vietnam: A Case-Control Study.

OBJECTIVE: To investigate the distribution of opportunistic infections (OIs) and factors associated with acquiring OIs in human immunodeficiency virus (HIV)-infected men who have sex with men (MSM) in comparison to those of heterosexual patients. METHOD: A cross-sectional study was conducted on 82 HIV-infected MSM and 120 HIV-infected heterosexual men in Bach Mai Hospital, Hanoi, Vietnam. Demographical characteristics and clinical data were collected and analyzed using appropriate statistics (Mann-Whitney, Chi-square, Fisher's exact test, and logistic regression). RESULTS: The prevalence of OIs among MSM and heterosexual patients were 63.4% and 81.7%, respectively. The most frequent OI in the MSM group was human papilloma virus (HPV) (11%), followed by hepatitis B virus (8.5%), mycobacterium tuberculosis (7.3%), and Talaromycosis (2.4%). CONCLUSIONS: Multivariate logistic regression analysis showed that buying sex (odds ratio (OR) = 4, 95% confidence interval (CI): 1.13-14.25) and injecting drugs (OR = 13.05, 95% CI: 2.39-71.21) were associated with increased odds of having OIs in heterosexual patients while increasing age (OR = 1.1, 95% CI: 1.01-1.24) was correlated to increased odd of acquiring OIs in the MSM group. HIV-infected MSM accumulates OIs with increasing age, while heterosexual individuals increase opportunistic infections by buying sex or injecting drugs.

Potential to mitigate ammonia emission from slurry by increasing dietary fermentable fiber through inclusion of tropical byproducts in practical diets for growing pigs.

OBJECTIVE: Research was conducted to test the effect of including fiber-rich feedstuffs in practical pig diets on nutrient digestibility, nitrogen balance and ammonia emissions from slurry. METHODS: Three Vietnamese fiber sources were screened, namely cassava leaf meal (CL), cassava root residue (CR), and tofu by-product (TF). Accordingly, a control diet (Con) with 10% of dietary non-starch polysaccharides (NSP) and three test diets including one of the three fiber-rich feedstuffs to reach 15% of NSP were formulated. All formulated diets had the same level of crude protein (CP), in vitro ileal protein digestible and metabolisable energy, whereas the in vitro hindgut volatile fatty acid (VFA) production of the test diets was 12% to 20% higher than the control diet. Forty growing barrows with initial body weight at 28.6±1.93 kg (mean±standard deviation) were allocated to the four treatments. When pigs reached about 50 kg of body weight, four pigs from each treatment were used for a nitrogen balance trial and ammonia emission assessment, the remaining six pigs continued the second period of the feeding trial. RESULTS: The TF treatment increased fecal VFA by 33% as compared with the control treatment (p = 0.07), suggesting stimulation of the hindgut fermentation. However, urinary N was not significantly reduced or shifted to fecal N, nor was slurry pH decreased. Accordingly, ammonia emissions were not mitigated. CR and CL treatments failed to enhance in vivo hindgut fermentation, as assessed by fecal VFA and purine bases. On the contrary, the reduction of CP digestibility in the CL treatment enhanced ammonia emissions from slurry. CONCLUSION: Dietary inclusion of cassava and tofu byproducts through an increase of dietary NSP from 10% to 15% might stimulate fecal VFA excretion but this does not guarantee a reduction in ammonia emissions from slurry, while its interaction with protein digestibility even might enhance enhanced ammonia emission.