Abstract
Despite advances in antiretroviral therapy (ART), human immunodeficiency virus (HIV) remains a significant issue in the United States. Early diagnosis, continuous treatment access/adherence, and long-term care engagement help patients benefit fully from ART; however, a shortfall in care engagement remains, potentially leading to poorer health outcomes. This analysis benchmarks rates of health care quality and process measures to identify areas for improvement. This retrospective, claims-based, real-world cohort study assessed the percentage of prevalent (existing) and incident (newly diagnosed) patients with HIV with commercial or public health insurance meeting 4 National Quality Forum (NQF)-endorsed, 1 Pharmacy Quality Alliance (PQA), and 3 Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) measures over a 4-year period. Most prevalent patients consistently met the NQF-endorsed prescribed ART and gaps in visits measures. Longer-term visit frequency measure rates were well below the 90% Joint United Nations Programme on HIV/AIDS target. Proportion of prevalent patients meeting each NQF-endorsed measure was maintained/increased with increasing age in 2015–2016. Substantially fewer incident patients than prevalent patients met NQF-endorsed measures across all measurement periods, particularly for visit frequency (32%–51%). PQA ART adherence was low (36%–73%). CDC receipt of care rates were high (83%–92%), whereas retention in care rates were low (67%–72%) among prevalent patients. For incident patients, linkage to care rates were consistently low (21%–44%). This study benchmarks current US HIV care engagement and highlights the need for improvement in early care engagement, ART adherence and long-term retention of care among patients with HIV.
Highlights
Human immunodeficiency virus (HIV) is a chronic acquired infection that results in the progressive loss of critical CD4 T-cells and impaired cellular immunity
Periodic viral load testing is an essential part of disease management follow-up, as more asymptomatic patients are treated with antiretroviral therapy (ART),[4] as it can help assess treatment effectiveness, ensure treatment optimization, prevent the emergence of human immunodeficiency virus (HIV) drug resistance and prevent transmission to others.[4,5]
Over the 4 years of analysis, there was a trend toward an increased percentage of incident patients with commercial/Medicare insurance being female or from the South, whereas for Medicaid insurance, there was a trend toward an increase in the percentage of incident patients being male (39% in 2013 vs 50% in 2016)
Summary
Human immunodeficiency virus (HIV) is a chronic acquired infection that results in the progressive loss of critical CD4 T-cells and impaired cellular immunity. HIV leads to the development of acquired immunodeficiency syndrome (AIDS).[1] Prompt diagnosis and early initiation of treatment are critical to successful disease management, which focuses on both reducing viral load to undetectable levels (eg,
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