Abstract: Objective To understand the immunological characteristics and chemotherapy effect of HIV infected patients with tuberculosis. Methods Cross-sectional study was performed to compare the lymphocyte subsets of 12 HIV infected patients with tuberculosis,24 HIV infected patients with latent M.tuberculosis infection,74 patients infected HIV only,56 active pulmonary tuberculosis without HIV infection and 36 normal controls,and data of full blood count,adverse reactions,convert of sputum test and lung pathological changes in HIV-infected patients with tuberculosis disease were prospectively collected to analyse their chemotherapy effect after 6 month therapy. Results(a) Compare to normal controls,both HIV infection and M.tuberculosis infection can result in a decrease of lymphocyte subset count among these patients(P<0.05).(b) Immunology changes correlated with HIV infection predominated among patients co-infected with HIV and M.tuberculosis,and their lymphcyte count decreased similarly whether their tuberculosis disease occurred or not.(c) Anti-tuberculosis therapy was good in HIV-infected patients with tuberculosis.There was no significant difference regarding occurrences of adverse reactions,convert of sputum test and changes of represents of chest radiography between HIV-infected patients with tuberculosis disease and patients with tuberculosis only(P>0.05). Conclusion Cell-mediated immunity of HIV-infected patients with tuberculosis mainly correlates with their HIV infection,and effective anti-tuberculosis therapy can enhance their cellular immune function and control their tuberculosis disease well.

Key words: HIV/AIDS, tuberculosis, purfied protein derivatives tuberculin test(PPD test), cell-mediated immunity, therapeutic efficacy