AIDS Defining Conditions
The Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) defines an HIV+ person with a CD4 cell count of 200 or less as having AIDS. The CDC has also developed a list of more than 20 opportunistic infections (OIs) that are considered AIDS-defining conditions (see below). If you have HIV and one or more of these OIs, you have a diagnosis of AIDS.
This list comes from a government report and contains medical terms. If you have any questions, contact a treatment educator at a local AIDS service organization or call an AIDS information line such as the Project Inform National HIV/AIDS Treatment Hotline at 800-822-7422.
- Candidiasis of bronchi, trachea, or lungs
- Candidiasis, esophageal
- Cervical cancer, invasive
- Coccidioidomycosis, disseminated or extrapulmonary
- Cryptococcosis, extrapulmonary
- Cryptosporidiosis, chronic intestinal (greater than 1 month's duration)
- Cytomegalovirus disease (other than liver, spleen, or nodes)
- Cytomegalovirus retinitis (with loss of vision
- Encephalopathy, HIV-related
- Herpes simplex: chronic ulcer(s) (greater than 1 month's duration); or bronchitis, pneumonitis, or esophagitis
- Histoplasmosis, disseminated or extrapulmonary
- Isosporiasis, chronic intestinal (greater than 1 month's duration)
- Kaposi's sarcoma
- Lymphoma, Burkitt's (or equivalent term)
- Lymphoma, immunoblastic (or equivalent term)
- Lymphoma, primary, of brain
- Mycobacterium avium complex or M. kansasii, disseminated or extrapulmonary
- Mycobacterium tuberculosis, any site (pulmonary or extrapulmonary) Mycobacterium, other species or unidentified species, disseminated or extrapulmonary
- Pneumocystis carinii pneumonia
- Pneumonia, recurrent
- Progressive multifocal leukoencephalopathy
- Salmonella septicemia, recurrent
- Toxoplasmosis of brain
- Wasting syndrome due to HIV
