Q. Why does AIDS cause skin lesions?
Doctor Answer is medically reviewed by SecondMedic medical review team.
AIDS causes skin lesions because Acquired Immunodeficiency Syndrome (AIDS) is caused by the Human Immunodeficiency Virus (HIV), and HIV can cause various skin conditions. These include a variety of rashes, sores, and lesions that appear in many different shapes and sizes.
The most common type of lesion associated with AIDS is Kaposi Sarcoma, which often appears as dark purple or brown spots on the face, hands, feet and legs. It may also show up as patches or raised bumps on other parts of the body. Other types of skin lesions that are commonly associated with AIDS include seborrheic dermatitis (red patches on scalp), folliculitis (inflamed hair follicles) , hand-foot-and-mouth disease (painful blisters in the mouth, palms and soles of feet ), herpes zoster virus infection (shingles) , varicella zoster virus infection (chickenpox ) , dermatophytosis fungal infections like athlete's foot or jock itch among others.
Although not every person who has HIV will experience these symptoms it’s important to be aware that they can occur during late stages of HIV infection when there is a weakened immune system caused by an advanced state of AIDS known as “immune reconstitution inflammatory syndrome” or IRIS for short. Therefore people living with HIV should take extra precautions to protect their Health such as practices good hygiene habits including regular washing & showering avoiding contact with potentially infected bodily fluids eating nourishing meals maintaining a healthy lifestyle managing stress etcetera - All these adaptive behaviours might help reduce risk factors related to poorer health outcomes if one develops any kind of skin condition related to HIV/AIDS .