APA Dictionary of Psychology

any in a class of drugs used to treat HIV or AIDS and hepatitis C that bind to viral proteases (enzymes that break down polypeptides and proteins) so that they cannot cleave viruses into the building blocks of infectious particles. To mitigate the risk of the viruses mutating to become resistant to these drugs, physicians usually prescribe more than one agent at a time. Possible side effects include lipodystrophy, Type 2 diabetes, liver toxicity, and kidney stones. Research is ongoing to determine whether protease inhibitors can also be used in the treatment of cancer, Alzheimer’s disease, and traumatic brain injury.