TAHOD Findings Published

July 2005—Since the TREAT Asia HIV Observational Database (TAHOD) was established in September 2003, it has grown in size and complexity. TAHOD’s goal has been to create a database of information about HIV in Asia in order to identify region-specific factors—biological, social, nutritional, and others—that may have differing impacts on how the virus progresses in Asia or how it should best be treated. Anonymous data is currently collected from more than 2,000 patients across the region, and the recent addition of Bali and Tokyo has brought the number of TREAT Asia sites involved to 13.

Now the scientific promise of TAHOD is coming to fruition. In February 2005, TAHOD’s first scientific paper—The TREAT Asia HIV Observational Database: Baseline and Retrospective Data—was published in the peer-reviewed Journal of Acquired Immune Deficiency Syndromes. Also that month, a second paper, Predicting Short-Term Disease Progression Among HIV-Infected Patients in Asia and the Pacific Region: Preliminary Results From TAHOD, was accepted for publication in HIV Medicine, the journal of the British HIV Association and the European AIDS Clinical Society. And in July, TAHOD will present a satellite symposium at the 7th International Conference on AIDS in Asia and the Pacific spotlighting national treatment programs from four countries that could influence the nature of HIV treatment in the region.