Quality of life of HIV-infected women / Qualidade de vida de mulheres com infecção pelo HIV

AUTOR(ES)
DATA DE PUBLICAÇÃO

2010

RESUMO

Introduction: The interest in assessing quality of life arises with the advances in medicine which have reduced mortality rates and increased expectancy of life. Objective: To evaluate de quality of life of HIV positive women and associated factors. Methods: A cross sectional study was carried out. Women were invited to participate in two outpatient clinics (Gynecology and Infectious Diseases) of a university hospital in the state of São Paulo - Brazil. In order to evaluate these women perception among 42 questions over nine domains which represent relevant aspects of quality of life, it was used the HIV/AIDS - Targets Quality of Life Instrument as well as a questionnaire on socio-demographic and clinic data which was elaborated for this study. Mann-Whitney s non parametric test was applied to compare the scores of the nine domains according to socio-demographic and clinical variables. Results: 176 women took part on the research; the mean age was 40, over half them declared to be non-white, and around half of them completed seventh grade of elementary school. The per capita income average was one and a half minimum salary and over half of the women had a paid work, a partner and was sexually active. Mean scores of the HAT-QOL dimensions varied from 43.4 to 92.4. The domains which presented the highest scores were: provider trust , medication concerns and overall function . The lower scores were observed for financial worries , disclosure worries and sexual functiona . Older women, those with a higher level of graduation, workers, with better income, and the ones who perceived that their global quality of life had not changed after diagnosis had better scores for health worries , and life satisfaction . The topic health worries was higher scored as antiviral therapy, and lower CD4 counts were shorter, but these clinical indicators did not modify life satisfaction . The domain disclosure worries was more relevant for the youngest, non-white skin, lower levels of schooling, those who had a partner, with a shorter time from diagnosis, under HAART and after non-sexual infection. Conclusion: The quality of life of HIV positive women was mainly more affected by social, affective-sexual characteristics as well as for their perception on how the diagnosis had impacted their quality of life than by clinical conditions. These results confirm the need for a global approach to the health of these women, which may help them to cope with a condition which can be affected by multiple cultural and psychological factors

ASSUNTO(S)

qualidade de vida questionarios virus women mulher quality of life questionnaire hiv hiv (virus)

ACESSO AO ARTIGO

Documentos Relacionados