Effective AIDS prevention and treatment programs for inner city African-American women should take into account the powerful impact that rape, mugging, and other forms of violence have on those who are HIV-infected, researchers say.
Family Health Project researchers report in the winter Journal of Traumatic Stress that HIV-infected low-income inner-city New Orleans women are two to five times more likely to be the victims of violence than their uninfected counterparts.
Victims reported higher levels of psychological distress, depression, and greater concern over physical symptoms than non-victimized HIV-infected women, the researchers found.
The study team interviewed 88 HIV-infected women and a comparison group of 148 uninfected women of similar background. Investigation of the impact of victimization, led by Rachel Kimerling, PhD, of the University of California-San Francisco, found that two-thirds of the HIV-infected group reported experiencing extreme forms of violent victimization.
"Furthermore, HIV-infected victims were diagnosed with higher rates of AIDS-defining conditions than HIV-infected nonvictims," they report. "These results underscore the importance of acknowledging the experience of violent victimization in the prevention and treatment of HIV infection in women."
The study is part of the Family Health Project Research Group's ongoing longitudinal investigation of the relationships between psychological and sociological factors and HIV infection among inner-city African-American families.
The rising incidence of HIV infection among inner-city low-income African-Americans appears to be largely mediated by environmental factors such as drugs, crime, poverty, and gender and racial discrimination, the team reports. An HIV-infected woman's ability to hold her own in this environment may be further impaired by depression, they say.
"Current prevention interventions for women which primarily target only safe sex skills and behaviors are failing to consider the social context of HIV infection. Acknowledging and addressing the social context, in terms of the presence of high rates of violent victimization of HIV-infected women, is imperative."
The Journal of Traumatic Stress is the peer-reviewed journal of the International Society of Traumatic Stress Studies. For information about the society and the journal, contact the editor, Dean Kilpatrick, Ph.D., 843-792-2945.
Posted by the Center for the Advancement of Health http://www.cfah.org. For information about the Center contact Richard Hebert rhebert@cfah.org, 202-387-2829.
Journal
Journal of Traumatic Stress