Efavirenz, emtricitabine, and tenofovir are approved individually by the FDA for the treatment of HIV infection in adults. Efavirenz and Emtricitabine have been approved for use in treating HIV in children.The three medications are often prescribed in unison and the manufacturers have combind them into a single tablet. Atripla (Tenovir/Emtricitabine/Efavirenz) came onto the market in July of 2006 as a FDA approved treatment for HIV. Atripla may be used as a complete regimen or in combination with other HIV medications.

As a result Atripla has become a leading medication in the fight against HIV/AIDS and has helped people living with HIV a great deal. This helps patients dealing with HIV by making their regimens both more simple and regimens more effective. This helps to reduce the amount of drug resistant mutations that happen.

Atripla does not cure or prevent HIV infection or HIV/AIDS and does not reduce the risk of passing the virus to other people. There are a number of side effects associated with the use of Atripla. More serious side effects of Efavirenz are confusion, depression, abnormal thinking, hallucinations, memory loss, thoughts of suicide, and paranoid thinking. Some patients can develop a severe rash. The medicine in Atripla can cause blood problems, muscle weakness, liver disease, blood problems and fatal lactic acidosis. Notify your doctor if you begin to experience pain in your joints, or muscles and weakness, trouble breathing, pain in your stomach with nausea or vomiting, feeling cold, irregular heartbeat, dizziness, jaundice, dark urine or loss of appetite. Patients should notify their doctor if they have any of the side effects listed. There are some side effects that are not as serious and generally lessen with continued use of the medication. Patients should notify their doctor if side effects continue or worsen. If you have hepatitis B and you stop taking Atripla it can cause a severe reaction.

The discuss about HIV/AIDS origin has resurfaced recently due to new information that has come to light debunking old theories about when HIV originated in human populations. This new information came to us by way of DNA analysis of the current HIV virus. Scientists now guess that HIV jump to human populations from monkeys in the early 1900's. This has done a good ob in putting to rest the old conspiracy theories about HIV being transmitted to humans by polio vaccines. HIV is thought to have jumped to the human population when indigenous African populations who consumed game meats regularly contracted it while butchering animals. A number of viruses humans have today have gotten into our population in similar ways including bird flu.

HIV 1 is the more virulent and common of the HIV strains. HIV 1 is the strain that infects most the world and qualifies HIV as a pandemic. HIV II is the less common strain of HIV that is less virulent. HIV 2 is mostly confined to West Africa, and not as prevalent. Both HIV 1 and HIV 2 are transmitted by bodily fluids. This means that the prevention of HIV rests on safe, and non risky practices. Including using condoms as well as other safe sex practices. AIDS occurs when AIDS HIV has progressed to the point as to promote opportunistic infections and other AIDS defining illnesses.

As treatments become more available the battle against HIV becomes more viable. Prevention needs to be a central pillar in combating AIDS/HIV, as well as aggressive treatment. HAART regimens (combinations of AIDS drugs) are the primary weapon we have and it has been very effective in slowing the progression of HIV. Breakthroughs like these have helped patients live a much longer and healthier life. A essential component in winning the fight against HIV is education, we need more HIV education. Misinformation and lack of understanding has been a huge contributer to the spread of HIV.

Each HIV-infected patient initially entering into care should have a complete medical history, physical examination, laboratory evaluation, and counseling. The purpose is to confirm the presence of HIV infection, obtain appropriate baseline historical and laboratory data, assure patient understanding about HIV infection, and initiate care as recommended by the HIV primary care guidelines and by the opportunistic treatment and prevention guidelines. Baseline data then is utilized to define management goals and future plans.

The following laboratory tests should be performed for a new patient during initial patient visits:

•  HIV antibody testing (if prior documentation not available) or if HIV RNA is undetectable (AI);
- CD4 + cell count
•  Plasma HIV RNA (viral load) (AI);
•  Complete blood count, chemistry profile, transaminase levels, BUN and creatinine, urinalysis, screening test
for syphilis (e.g., RPR, VDRL, or treponema EIA), tuberculin skin test (TST) or interferon-? release assay
IGRA (unless there is history of a prior TB or positive TST or IGRA), anti Toxoplasma gondii IgG,
hepatitis A, B, and C serologies, and Pap smear in women;
- Fasting blood glucose and serum lipids if the person is considered to be at risk for heart disease and for
baseline evaluation before the start of ARV therapy and
• For patients who have pretreatment HIV RNA >1,000 copies/mL, genotypic resistance testing when the
patient enters into care, regardless of whether therapy will be initiated immediately (AIII). For patients who
have HIV RNA levels of 500–1,000 copies/mL, resistance testing also may be considered, even though
amplification may not always be successful (BII). If therapy is deferred, repeat testing at the time of
antiretroviral initiation should be considered (CIII).

Patients living with HIV infection must often cope with multiple social, psychiatric, and medical issues that are best
addressed through a multidisciplinary approach to the disease. The evaluation also must include assessment of
drug abuse, economic factors (e.g., unstable housing), social support, mental illness, comorbidities, high-risk behaviors, and other factors that are known to impair the ability to adhere to treatment and to promote education about HIV Once evaluated, these factors should be managed accordingly.
Lastly,  risk behaviors and effective strategies to prevent HIV transmission. to others should be
provided at each patient clinic visit.

Despite substantial advances in the treatment of human immunodeficiency virusAIDS/HIV infection, the estimated number of annual new HIV infections in the United States has remained at 40,000 for over 10 years. HIV prevention in this country has largely focused on persons who are not HIV infected, to help them avoid becoming infected. However, further reduction of transmission of HIV will require using some new strategies, including more emphasis on stoping transmission of HIV. HIV-infected persons who are aware of their HIV infection tend to reduce behaviors that might transmit HIV to others. Nonetheless, recent reports suggest that such behavioral changes often are not maintained and that a substantial number of HIV-infected persons continue to engage in behaviors that place others at risk for HIV infection.

Reverting to risky behavior can be as important in the transmission of HIV as the orignal failure to adopt safer sex practices. Unprotected anal sex seems to be happening more often in some urban centers, especially amoung young men who have sex with other men. Bacterial and viral sexually transmitted diseases (STDs) in HIV-infected men and women receiving outpatient care have been increasingly noted, indicating ongoing risky behaviors and opportunities for HIV transmission. Despite the decline in syphilis infection rate in the general U.S. population, continued outbreaks of syphilis in MSM, many of whom are co-infected with HIV, continue to happen in some areas; rates of gonorrhea and chlamydial infection have risen in this population as well. Rising STD rates among MSM indicate increased potential for HIV transmission, both because these rates suggest ongoing risky behavior and because STDs have a synergistic effect on HIV infectivity and susceptibility. Studies suggest that optimism about the effectiveness of highly active antiretroviral therapy (HAART) for HIV may be contributing to relaxed attitudes toward safer sex practices and increased sexual risk-taking by some HIV-infected persons.

Drug use still continues to play a big role in the HIV pandemic; 28% of HIV/AIDS cases in adults and adolescents with known HIV risk category report to the CDC in 2000 were associated with needle drug use. In some drug using communites, HIV seroincidene and seroprevalence in injection drug users has declined recently. This decline has been attributed to several factors, including increased use of sterile injection equipment, declines in needle-sharing, shifts from injection to noninjection methods of using drugs, and cessation of drug use. Injection drug use amoung heroin users has helped to increase HIV infection substantially in some areas, serving as a reminder that avoiding all high risk behavior is important.

Clinicians providing medical care to HIV-infected persons can play a key role in helping their patients reduce risk behaviors and maintain safer practices and can do so with a feasible level of effort, even in constrained practice settings. Clinicians can greatly affect patients' risks for transmission of HIV to others by performing a brief screening for HIV transmission risk behaviors; communicating prevention messages; discussing sexual and drug-use behavior; positively reinforcing changes to safer behavior; referring patients for such services as substance abuse treatment; facilitating partner notification, counseling, and testing; and identifying and treating other STDs. These measures may also decrease patients' risks of acquiring other STDs and bloodborne infections (e.g., hepatitis). Managed care plans can play an important role in HIV prevention by incorporating these recommendations into their practice guidelines, educating their providers and enrollees, and providing condoms and educational materials. In the context of care, prevention services might be delivered in clinic or office environments or through referral to community-based programs. Some clinicians have expressed concern that reimbursement is often not provided for prevention services and note that improving reimbursement for such services might enhance the adoption and implementation of these guidelines.