Optimal control of combined therapy in a single strain HIV-1 model
Date
2005-05-17
Authors
Garira, Winston
Musekwa, Senelani D.
Shiri, Tinevimbo
Journal Title
Journal ISSN
Volume Title
Publisher
Texas State University-San Marcos, Department of Mathematics
Abstract
Highly active antiretroviral therapy (HAART) is administered to symptomatic human immunodeficiency virus (HIV) infected individuals to improve their health. Various administration schemes are used to improve patients' lives and at the same time suppressing development of drug resistance, reduce evolution of new viral strains, minimize serious side effects, improve patient adherence and also reduce the costs of drugs. We deduce an optimal drug administration scheme useful in improving patients' health especially in poor resourced settings. In this paper we use the Pontryagin's Maximum Principle to derive optimal drug dosages based on a mathematical dynamical model. We use methods of optimal control to determine optimal controls analytically, and then use the Runge-Kutta scheme of order four to numerically simulate different therapy effects. We simulate the different effects of a drug regimen composed of a protease inhibitor and a nucleoside reverse transcriptase inhibitor. Our results indicate that for highly toxic drugs, small dosage sizes and allowing drug holidays make a profound impact in both improving the quality of life and reducing economic costs of therapy. The results show that for drugs with less toxicity, continuous therapy is beneficial.
Description
Keywords
HIV, Mathematical model, Optimal control, Combined therapy
Citation
Garira, W., Musekwa, S. D., & Shiri, T. (2005). Optimal control of combined therapy in a single strain HIV-1 model. <i>Electronic Journal of Differential Equations, 2005</i>(52), pp. 1-22.
Rights
Attribution 4.0 International