Health Economics of HIV in Rural India
Filed under: Health Economics, Health Research
This article was published in the Asia Pacific Disability Rehabilitation Journal in 2007.
“Like in most chronic illnesses, economic stability is a major anchor to continued compliance in HIV treatment and follow-up. The affected male is usually the major breadwinner. Number of man-days lost by the affected person and the caretaker, expenses due to treatment and related issues, physical and emotional consequences on family members, magico-religious approaches, trials with undocumented alternate systems of medicines and other unwarranted approaches cause an immense burden on the meagre resources of the family. In a study of families of 30 male HIV affected persons with a longitudinal clinical follow-up, evaluation of health behaviour, attitude of the family members, burden on the family and financial coping as an unit was done using standard methods. Results indicated that nuclear families with a single earning member suffered the most. Financial status and family attitudes were significant factors in decision-making. The burden experienced by the families, including the financial burden, was a function of length of sickness, the clinical staging of the illness, nature and extent of complications and presence of behavioural sequelae. The results showed that simple psycho-educational methods and therapeutic family intervention would help in managing the situation more optimally with judicious use of the family’s limited resources and effective care of the affected person.”
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