According to an Italian study presented at this year's 14th International AIDS Conference in Barcelona, Spain, medications known as protease inhibitors may increase a patient's risk of developing heart disease. Since their initial use in the mid-1990s to fight the spread of HIV, protease inhibitors have been linked to rises in cholesterol, blood sugar, and triglyceride levels.

In the study, which followed 1,200 HIV-positive people over a three-year period, patients were assigned a drug combination either with or without a protease inhibitor. Twenty-three cases of coronary heart disease were diagnosed in patients taking protease inhibitors. In the group that did not take protease inhibitors, only two cases of heart disease were seen. Researchers involved in the study warn that the results are still inconclusive and that more analysis is needed before a definitive conclusion can be made.