Tanu's Research Blog

HAART Use on Quality of Life

Since the inception of the HIV/AIDS epidemic, different medical outcomes have been examined to assess disease progression and treatment effects. Health related quality of life (QOL) was first introduced into HIV/AIDS research in 1990 to evaluate the effect of antiretroviral therapy on health status and well being, and was then used to document disease burden, track health changes and evaluate health care programs.

Before the era of HAART, population studies have shown that physical health QOL deteriorated with HIV disease progression. Mental health functioning was relatively stable across different stages of disease, but was significantly worse than the general population and patients with other chronic diseases. Use of mono- or combination therapies was insufficient for containing the virus and studies of their use on QOL have yielded inconsistent results, reporting short-term positive or negative effects but no significant long-term impacts.

Even though QOL, a concept encompassing a broad range of physical and psychological characteristics and limitations that describes an individual's ability to function, is increasingly recognized as an important outcome in health care, little is known of the quality of life of children infected with HIV, especially in an era of highly active antiretroviral medications.

We have undertaken a study to assess the impacts of HIV infection and HAART use on QOL among a group of HIV infected and affected children. For further details please refer to the abstract.

Posted at 12:19AM May 07, 2008 by Tanushree Banerjee in Research  |  Comments[0]