Study Finds That Feelings Of Stigmatization May Discourage HIV Patients From Undergoing Proper Care
A recent study published in Journal of General Internal Medicine found that HIV-infected individuals living with feelings of stigmatization have inadequate access to care or poor adherence to antiretroviral therapy (ART).
This is one of the few studies conducted to analyze the correlation between HIV stigma and self-reported access to care, regular source of HIV care, and ART adherence, as well as the effect of mental health in these correlations.
The study was conducted on 202 HIV-positive men and women in Los Angeles County, many of which were minorities and many had limited education and income.
Results showed that individuals who experienced high levels of internal stigmatization were four times more likely to report poor access to medical care and were three times more likely to report decreased adherence to HIV medications.
Among the patients studied, 33 percent reported experiencing high levels of stigma. In addition, 77 percent of individuals reported limited access to care, 45 percent reported lower adherence to ART, and 10.5 percent reported having no access to care.
One limitation of the study was that it did not measure all the social aspects that may have an affect on HIV stigma. Also, the study was not able to include all individuals who did not receive care.
These findings reveal the need for an increase in education and awareness within the HIV-infected population about HIV and the stigma surrounding the disease in order to help individuals in seeking out and receiving care.
For more information about the study, please see UCLA’s press release and the Journal of General Internal Medicine’s publication.
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- Poor Sleep Decreases Antiretroviral Adherence In People With HIV
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As someone diagnosed with AIDS in 1993, I wanted to offer a possible explanation for the growing complaints of stigmatization by healthcare providers.
Prior to effective treatments and federal funding for AIDS, most healthcare workers were extremely reluctant to work with PWAs. The result was the AIDS clinics were largely staffed by lesbian and gay male providers who volunteered to work with the gay men who made up the epidemic. The patients and providers had similar demographics and life experience.
Beginning in the mid-1990s, AIDS clinics and organizations began to be staffed, instead, by “professionalized” personnel who viewed their work as a paycheck, nothing more. Long time volunteers and experienced but under-credentialed workers were replaced by workers with degrees but to no attachment to or real understanding of AIDS-affected groups. Some current AIDS providers disapprove of homosexuality for religious or other reasons. (In San Francisco, at least one administrator of an AIDS facility donated money to California Proposition 8.) The result is that people with AIDS correctly believe that their providers look down on their sexual orientation.
Attributing the problem to “mental health” simply pathologizes patients’ accurate perception that their providers disapprove of their sexual orientation, or should I say, “risk behavior?”
As a heterosexual, African American woman whose been diagnosed HIV positive since June 1990, my experience with stigmatization has came directly from my community. In part, I believe that stigmatization is just another social deterinant of health that perpuates high HIV infection rates in communities of color.
Amen to Long Term Survivor. I have noticed the same chain of events at our Aids Project here in Nebraska. Dirty rotten shame. Just sign me helpless & hopeless.