| International Journal of Current Microbiology and Applied Sciences |
| ISSN: 2319-7706 Volume 2 Number 7 (2013) pp. 164-170 |
| Comparison of attitude of health care professionals and experience of HIV patients towards HIV/AIDS related stigma and discrimination |
| T.Jeevitha, R.S.Vigneshwari, M.Pratheepapriyadharsini and A.Uma |
| Department of Microbiology, Chennai Medical College Hospital and Research Centre, Irungalur, Trichy. *Corresponding author e-mail: jeevithajeevankumar@gmail.com |
| A B S T R A C T |
| To elicit the attitude of health care professionals towards HIV related stigma and discrimination and to assess the experience of HIV patients towards HIV related stigma and discrimination. A questionnaire survey was conducted among doctors (n=100), nurses/laboratory technicians (n=100) in rural teaching hospital and people living with HIV/AIDS (n=50). Three Different self-assessed questionnaires were set for doctors, nurses/laboratory technicians and people living with HIV/AIDS. Participants were directly approached by investigators and the data obtained were correlated and analyzed statistically using SPSS software. 78% of doctors accepted that they had fear over touching sweat/saliva whereas 63% of nurses accepted that they had fear over dressing the wounds of HIV patients. 84% of HIV patients experienced that they have not been treated in time. Delivery for HIV positive women were refused by 62% of the doctors and 80% of the patients were referred to other institutions. People living with HIV were experienced that 88% of the doctors refused to conduct surgery and 85% of doctors were also accepted about rejection of surgery. Only 3% of doctors accepted that they had performed surgeries/Invasive procedure for HIV patients. We recommend that seminars, workshops should be organized on a continuous basis for health care workers on universal precautions, stigma and discrimination reduction. The institution should also make available materials needed to protect workers against the risk of acquiring pathogenic infection in the course of providing health services to their patients. |
| Keywords |
| HIV stigma; Attitude of healthcare workers; Stigma and Discrimination |