Objective: The primary endpoint of the study was to determine the proportion of patients with HIV RNA < 50 copies/mL at 48 weeks. Design: Phase IV, multicentric, open-label, single-arm clinical trial of participants recruited in 2018−2019 to evaluate the efficacy and safety of tenofovir alafenamide/emtricitabine/elvitegravir-cobicistat (TAF/FTC/EVG-c) as first-line treatment in HIV-1 infected naïve participants with advanced disease. Methods: Adverse events were graded according to the Division of AIDS scale version 2.0. Quantitative variables were recorded as median and interquartile range, and qualitative variables as absolute number and percentage. T-Student or Wilcoxon tests were used to analyze intragroup differences of the continuous variables. Results: Fifty participants were recruited with a baseline median CD4 lymphocyte count of 116 cells/µL and a viral load of 218,938 copies/mL. The proportion of patients with viral load <50 copies/mL at week 48 was 94% in the per-protocol analysis, with a median time of 1.9 months to achieve it. Three adverse events attributed to the study drug caused trial discontinuation. Conclusions: the use of TAF/FTC/EVG-c in patients with advanced HIV disease in our study demonstrated efficacy comparable to data from pivotal clinical trials with a good safety profile.
Keywords: HIV; antiretroviral treatment; severe immunosuppression.