Joint inference on HIV viral dynamics and immune suppression in presence of measurement errors.

In an attempt to provide a tool to assess antiretroviral therapy and to monitor disease progression, this article studies association of human immunodeficiency virus (HIV) viral suppression and immune restoration. The data from a recent acquired immune deficiency syndrome (AIDS) study are used for illustration. We jointly model HIV viral dynamics and time to decrease in CD4/CD8 ratio in the presence of CD4 process with measurement errors, and estimate the model parameters simultaneously via a method based on a Laplace approximation and the commonly used Monte Carlo EM algorithm. The approaches and many of the points presented apply generally.