Nail Changes in Patients Infected With Human Immunodeficiency Virus: A Prospective Controlled Study

OBJECTIVES To study the frequency of nail changes in a population of human immunodeficiency virus (HIV)–infected patients and to evaluate the specificity of these findings by comparison with HIV-negative control subjects. DESIGN Prospective controlled study. Nail changes were recorded by a standardized clinical examination (curvature, nail plate, color, onychomycosis). In case of clinical diagnosis of onychomycosis, mycological culture was performed. SETTING Primary care university hospital. PATIENTS A total of 155 HIV-1–positive patients and 103 healthy HIV-negative control subjects of comparable age and sex ratio. INTERVENTION None. MAIN OUTCOME MEASURE Clinical examination findings. RESULTS Nail symptoms were present in 67.7% of HIV-positive patients vs 34.0% of controls (P