AIDS dementia complex

January 2007     View PDF     En español

The symptoms of ADC

Properly diagnosing ADC is heavily dependent on the keen judgment of doctors, often together with specialists like psychiatric, brain or neurology experts. It’s easy to imagine how difficult it is to determine impairments in mood and behavior since there’s no standard or common course of ADC. In one person it may be very mild with periods of varying severity of symptoms. In another it can be abrupt, severe and progressive. Currently, there is no way to tell how a person will progress with ADC.

Sometimes symptoms of ADC are overlooked or dismissed by caregivers, who may believe the symptoms are due to advanced HIV disease. In fact, people with advanced disease generally do not have symptoms of ADC but do have fairly normal mental functioning as long as they also have no other neurological problems. At the other end of the spectrum, ADC should be carefully distinguished from severe depression—common among people with HIV that may result in symptoms similar to ADC.

ADC occurs more commonly in children with HIV than with adults. It presents similarly and is often more severe and progressive.