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Women with HIV can benefit from testosterone treatment
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NEW YORK (Reuters Health) - Treatment with transdermal testosterone is well tolerated and can markedly increase muscle strength in HIV-infected women with low body weight, according to a report published in the April 26th issue of the Archives of Internal Medicine.
"There has been very little research in the use of androgens to treat HIV-infected women," senior author Dr. Steven Grinspoon, from the Massachusetts General Hospital in Boston, said in a statement. "We found that giving natural testosterone at levels that are normal for women produces significant improvement for patients with few other treatment options."
The study involved 57 women who had lost an average of 18% of their pre-illness weight (mean BMI, 20.6) and had total testosterone levels below the median of the reference range of 10-55 ng/dL. They were randomized to receive transdermal testosterone or placebo twice weekly for 6 months.
As expected, treatment with the active product was associated with a significant increase (+37 ng/dL) in testosterone levels compared with placebo (-2 ng/dL). Moreover, use of the testosterone patch was well tolerated and did not adversely affect immune function, glucose and lipid metabolism, liver function, or body composition and did not promote hirsutism.
There was a trend toward increased muscle mass with testosterone therapy, the investigators point out. Moreover, subjects treated with the patch demonstrated significant improvements in shoulder flexion, elbow flexion, knee extension, and knee flexion compared with subjects who received placebo.
The results suggest that "testosterone may be a useful adjunctive therapy to maintain muscle function in symptomatic HIV-infected women," Dr. Grinspoon's group concludes.
Arch Intern Med 2004;164:897-904.
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