Nutrition

While proper nutrition is a good idea for everyone, it is especially important for people with HIV. Reduced appetite, nausea, fatigue, and decreased absorption of nutrients by the body—symptoms seen in people with HIV—lead to malnutrition and weight loss. This can have a negative effect on your overall health and makes it even more important that individuals with HIV take special efforts to maintain a healthy diet.

Ways to avoid weight loss and maintain your proper weight include:

• Eating more frequent meals daily with healthy snacks in between meals.
• Slowly increasing the fat content of your meals.
• Eating more staple foods like rice, maize, millet, sorghum, wheat, bread, potatoes, sweet potatoes, yams, and bananas.
• Eating meat, poultry, fish, and eggs as often as possible.
• Adding more dairy products to your diet.
• Increasing intake of vitamins and minerals.

For more ideas on how to maintain proper nutrition, visit the "Special eating needs for people living with HIV/AIDS" web page on the Food and Agriculture Organization of the United Nations site.