Illness Experience: Fears And Expectations Of HIV Positive Patients Attending The Special Treatment Clinic At University Of Calabar Teach Hospital, Calabar.

Abstract

Background
Each individual experiences their symptoms differently. Illness generally has a psychosocial aspect which is not commonly explored by physicians. Amongst patients living with HIV/AIDS, it is important to explore their day to day experiences with their illness in order to deeply understand how they cope with their illness. This will enable the physician to offer the holistic care which will lead to better health outcomes. This study therefore aims to determine the fears and expectations of HIV positive patients in order to proffer solutions that will improve treatment outcomes.

Method
This was a cross-sectional hospital-based study using a semi-structured questionnaire that assessed the socio-demographic characteristics of the respondents. The study site was the Special Treatment Clinic of University of Calabar Teaching Hospital, Calabar. The patients’ fears and expectations about HIV were explored after informed consent had been collected. Two hundred and sixty-three HIV positive adult patients were recruited into the study. Data gencrated was entered and analyzed using the Scientific Package for Social Sciences (SPSS) Version 15.0.

Results
The age group with the highest frequency was 40-49 years. Almost all the participants had formal
education and the most were public servants. More than half (1/2) of the study participants had HIV for 1-10 years. Almost a fifth (1/5) had associated comorbid conditions. In all assessed parameters of fear in the study, well over three quarters of the patient admitted to experiencing fear regarding every aspect of HIV and its management. Fear of long term use of medication ranked highly with the patients closely ranked by fear of side effects of medication. With regards to expectations, almost all the participants in this study required one form of information or the other regarding HIV and about three quarter the patient expected to take their medication for life while slightly above fifty percent of the participants expected to be cured of HIV. There was also a significant relationship between
fear of death and duration of illness. There was also a significant relationship between fear of lifestyle modification and the presence of comorbidity.

Conclusion
The study supports the fact that People Living with HIV/AIDS (PLWHIV) have varying illness experiences including fears and expectations regarding their condition, and that this may be related to the presence of a comorbidity or duration of their illness and the study recommends that doctors should tailor the management of individual patients to suit the patients’ unique experience.