Further information

A good general home reference book (not just HIV-related side effects) including illustrated information on how drugs work and on many individual drugs is the:

‘BMA New Guide to Medicines and Drugs’. Produced by the British Medical Association, 2007 7th edition. Published by Dorling Kindersley for £16.99.

Much of the most easily readable and up-to-date information on side effects and HIV is available on the internet.

The following links were correct when we went to press. If you have trouble finding an article or link call the i-Base phoneline on 0800 800 6013 and we’ll try to help.

Treatment guidelines
Internet references
Alternative treatments
More information on the web

Treatment guidelines

Treatment guidelines often have good supportive information on managing side effects:

The British HIV Association (UK)
www.bhiva.org

The European AIDS Clinical Society (Europe)
www.eacs.eu

AIDSinfo services
www.paidsinfo.nih.gov/default.aspx

Internet references

The Canadian community organisation CATIE has a comprehensive guide to side effects that may cover other areas and options
www.catie.ca/sideeffects_e.nsf

One of the most useful HIV sites with search facilities for many community, activist and medical professsional publications is at:
www.aegis.org/sitemap.asp

AEGiS.com also includes an excellent and comprehensive database of conference abstracts, that are posted to the internet shortly after international meetings
www.aegis.org/conferences/

Many conferences publish studies on the internet and some also let you hear lectures and see slides from some sessions. Important sites for 2008 meetings include...

Conference on Retroviruses and Opportunistic Infections (CROI)
www.retroconference.org/2008/

International AIDS Society Conferences
www.iasociety.org/Default.aspx?pageId=3

Reports from these and other meetings are usually available shortly after the meetings on the following sites:

HIV i-Base (this site).
www.i-base.info
National AIDS Manual
www.aidsmap.com
The Body
www.thebody.com/index/treat/oipage.html
NATAP
www.natap.org
Medscape
www.medscape.com/home
aidsmeds.com
http://www.aidsmeds.com

Alternative treatments

A useful site for supplements, nutrients and alternative treatments for neuropathy:

Peripheral Neuropathy Web Resources
www.pn.uku.co.uk/links/Treatments.html

A community site with a range of information on fat loss. As well as facial fat loss this is one of the few sites that includes an overview of fat loss from the buttocks.

FacialWasting.org
www.facialwasting.org

General information

Excellent single subject fact sheets written in a clear non-technical language on many side effects are available on the New Mexico AIDS Infonet
www.aidsinfonet.org/factsheets.php

The UK aidsmap site has a range of basic factsheets
www.aidsmap.com/cms1000229.asp

This site also has very useful overviews of individual drugs and their side-effects in the ‘Drugs used by people with HIV’ link.

A list of UK clinical trials is also available on aidsmap, but not all studies are included, so you may want to also check with your own hospital and the larger London hopsitals.

A site with useful links to longer articles from community publications is the opportunistic infections page of The Body's treatment publication section
www.thebody.com/index/treat/oipage.html

The quarterly newsletter from San Francisco AIDS Foundation includes very good articles on individual side effects and older articles tend to remain useful and relevant – Beta
www.sfaf.org/treatment/beta/chronological.html

Physicians Research Notebook (PRN)

An excellent bi-monthly magazine that includes features, interviews, treatment and lifestyle issues is available in print with archive online
www.positivenation.co.uk

- detailed articles on many current aspects of treating and mangaging HIV, including side effects
www.prn.org

Positive Nation magazine

An excellent bi-monthly magazine that includes features, interviews, treatment and lifestyle issues is available in print with archive online
www.positivenation.co.uk

Websites on drug interactions

Liverpool HIV Pharmacology Group (LHPG)
www.HIV-druginteractions.org

HIV Pharmacology
www.HIVpharmacology.com

Online calculators

For risk of heart disease and kidney function:

Different calculators use different data sets. None is 100% accurate or validated for HIV. See:

The University of Edinburgh Cardiovascular Risk Calculator
cvrisk.mvm.ed.ac.uk/calculator/bnf.htm

A calculator that includes race may help Black/non-Caucasian people:

ETHRISK CHD and CVD risk calculator for British ethnic groups
www.epi.bris.ac.uk/CVDethrisk/CHD_CVD_form.html

A research site with heart risk and kidney function (estimated GFR) calculators is at:

Copenhagen HIV Programme (CHIP)
www.cphiv.dk/TOOLS.aspx

For BMI, smoking etc:

A range of NHS calculators include BMI (for weight) and savings (from stopping smoking):

NHS Direct Interactive tools
www.nhsdirect.nhs.uk/magazine/interactive/