ArticleClinical infectious diseases : an official publication of the Infectious Diseases Society of America2017
Neurosyphilis Increases Human Immunodeficiency Virus (HIV)-associated Central Nervous System Inflammation but Does Not Explain Cognitive Impairment in HIV-infected Individuals With Syphilis.
Article in Clinical infectious diseases : an official publication of the Infectious Diseases Society of America, 2017. The graph could read no effect estimate from its abstract, so it casts no vote on the map. Cited by 8 papers, 1 of them a synthesis that pooled it.
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Who cites it
8 citing papers in PubMed, 1 synthesis or guideline pooled it, 21 citations in OpenAlex.
- Management of Adult Syphilis: Key Questions to Inform the 2021 Centers for Disease Control and Prevention Sexually Transmitted Infections Treatment Guidelines.Clinical infectious diseases : an official publication of the Infectious Diseases Society of America · 2022Pooled it
- Syphilis and neurosyphilis in people living with HIV: analysis of cerebrospinal fluid findings.Infection · 2026Article
- Characterization of HIV-Associated Neurocognitive Impairment in Middle-Aged and Older Persons With HIV in Lima, Peru.Frontiers in neurology · 2021Article
- Elevation of Cerebrospinal Fluid Light and Heavy Neurofilament Levels in Symptomatic Neurosyphilis.Sexually transmitted diseases · 2020Article
- Altered Brain Function in Young HIV Patients with Syphilis Infection: A Voxel-Wise Degree Centrality Analysis.Infection and drug resistance · 2020Article
- The Neurocognitive Assessment in the Metabolic and Aging Cohort (NAMACO) study: baseline participant profile.HIV medicine · 2020Article
- Neurosyphilis During Acute HIV Infection: A CNS Immunologic and Virologic Characterization.Journal of acquired immune deficiency syndromes (1999) · 2019Article
- Immunological Changes in Monocyte Subsets and Their Association With Foxp3Frontiers in immunology · 2019Article
Corrections and comments
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Authors and funding
7 authors at 3 institutions in 2 countries.
Funding
Abstract
backgroundIndividuals infected with human immunodeficiency virus (HIV) who have previously had syphilis may have cognitive impairment. We tested the hypothesis that neurosyphilis causes cognitive impairment in HIV by amplifying HIV-related central nervous system (CNS) inflammation.
methodsHIV-infected participants enrolled in a study of cerebrospinal fluid (CSF) abnormalities in syphilis underwent the mental alternation test (MAT), venipuncture, and lumbar puncture. CSF concentrations of chemokine (C-X-C motif) ligand 10 (CXCL10), chemokine (C-C motif) ligand 2 (CCL2), and neurofilament light (NFL) were determined by commercial assays. The proportion of peripheral blood mononuclear cells (PBMCs) and of CSF white blood cells (WBCs) that were activated monocytes (CD14+CD16+) was determined by flow cytometry. Neurosyphilis was defined as detection of Treponema pallidum 16S RNA in CSF or CSF white blood cells (WBCs) >20/uL or a reactive CSF-Venereal Disease Research Laboratory (VDRL) test; uncomplicated syphilis was defined as undetectable CSF T. pallidum, CSF WBCs ≤5/uL and nonreactive CSF-VDRL. MAT <18 was considered low.
resultsMedian proportion of PBMCs that were activated monocytes (16.6 vs. 5.3), and median CSF CXCL10 (10658 vs. 2530 units), CCL2 (519 vs. 337 units) and HIV RNA (727 vs. 50 c/mL) were higher in neurosyphilis than in uncomplicated syphilis (P ≤ .001 for all comparisons). Neurosyphilis was not related to low MAT scores. Participants with low MAT scores had higher median CSF CXCL10 (10299 vs. 3650 units, P = .008) and CCL2 (519 vs. 365 units, P = .04) concentrations than those with high MAT scores.
conclusionsNeurosyphilis may augment HIV-associated CNS inflammation, but it does not explain cognitive impairment in HIV-infected individuals with syphilis.
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