What Causes AIDS Wasting Syndrome?
If you have AIDS, the following factors can work together to promote weight loss and wasting syndrome: Not eating enough. It may be difficult to get adequate nutrition for reasons such as these: • Poor appetite from HIV infection • Medication side effects, such as nausea, changes in taste, or mouth tingling • Opportunistic infection symptoms, such as a painful throat or sense of fullness • Lack of money or energy to shop for and prepare meals • Depression Not absorbing nutrients well. This may happen because: • HIV directly affects the intestinal lining. • Opportunistic infections interfere with absorption. • Medications cause diarrhea, which leads to loss of calories and nutrients. Changes in metabolism. This can occur for many reasons. • HIV disease burns calories fast, so you need more calories to maintain your body weight. This need for extra calories may be due to the increased activity of the immune system. Or it may be because HIV changes levels of hormones that affect how fast
