HIV disclosure rates
Julianne Serovich studies how HIV patients deal with informing their families about their infections. Serovich et al (2005) found that men with HIV were most like to disclose their status to a mother or sister. Serovich et al predicted (from their results) that about 50% of HIV-positive men's mothers would be told about their son's infection within 10 months of diagnosis. Serovich et al (2007) looked at similar data for women, and found that about 67% of mothers would hear about their daughter's infection within 6 months of diagnosis. AIDSmap.com points out that social support is thought to have an impact on clinical outcomes for HIV/AIDS. However, despite their higher rates of disclosure to family, and less advanced infections, women score lower on health-related quality of life measures, according to Cederfjall et al (2001).
This could be due to family reactions, or to cultural factors. 68% of the women in Serovich 2007 were African-American, but the men in Serovich 2005 were 86% Caucasian. 57% of the men and 41% of the women had at least some college education. All of the men were gay; no sexual orientation data is given about the women. In short, these groups differ on a lot more factors than their gender, and differences in disclosure rates or quality of life could reflect any of these differences. As I mentioned in November, fear of social stigma seems to affect the testing rates in African-American populations.
Shit, HIV infection figures make me angry -- I feel so helpless to do anything about it. I get tested annually, and I talk to young, fresh-faced, volunteers twice a year about how to do safer sex outreach, but ... well, I'm white, most of them are white, and most of the places that they're going to do outreach are filled with gay white men. And I don't know what to do to change that.
So far, all of my HIV tests have come back negative, and I do what I can to keep it that way. However, in 1996, when I was diagnosed with herpes, I made the decision to tell my mother about it pretty quickly. I'm still never sure if that was a good idea or a bad one.
This could be due to family reactions, or to cultural factors. 68% of the women in Serovich 2007 were African-American, but the men in Serovich 2005 were 86% Caucasian. 57% of the men and 41% of the women had at least some college education. All of the men were gay; no sexual orientation data is given about the women. In short, these groups differ on a lot more factors than their gender, and differences in disclosure rates or quality of life could reflect any of these differences. As I mentioned in November, fear of social stigma seems to affect the testing rates in African-American populations.
Shit, HIV infection figures make me angry -- I feel so helpless to do anything about it. I get tested annually, and I talk to young, fresh-faced, volunteers twice a year about how to do safer sex outreach, but ... well, I'm white, most of them are white, and most of the places that they're going to do outreach are filled with gay white men. And I don't know what to do to change that.
So far, all of my HIV tests have come back negative, and I do what I can to keep it that way. However, in 1996, when I was diagnosed with herpes, I made the decision to tell my mother about it pretty quickly. I'm still never sure if that was a good idea or a bad one.