The impact of HIV/AIDS on the quality of life: a cross sectional study in north India.

OBJECTIVE

To determine the impact of Human Deficiency Virus (HIV)/Acquired Immunodeficiency Syndrome (AIDS) on the quality of life (QOL) on such patients in North India.

DESIGN

A cross sectional study.

SETTING

Outpatient setting and wards, Department of Medicine at a premier tertiary health care center, North India.

PARTICIPANTS

Sixty-eight consecutive HIV/AIDS patients attending Medicine out patient department and/or admitted to the wards of All India Institute of Medical Sciences were administered a structured questionnaire by the HIV nurse coordinator. QOL was evaluated using the WHOQOL-Bref (Hindi) instrument.

ANALYSIS

One way Analysis of Variance (ANOVA) was performed to find out significant difference between the clinical categories and socio-demographic variables on QOL domains.

RESULTS

The overall QOL mean score on a scale of 0-100 was found to be 25.8. Similarly, on the scale of 0-100 the mean scores in the four domains of QOL in descending order were social (80.9); psychological (27.5); physical (17.7) and environmental domain (11.65). There was a significant difference of quality of life in the physical domain between asymptomatic patients (14.6) and patients with AIDS (10.43) defining illnesses (p< 0.001) and asymptomatic and early symptomatic (12) patients (p=0.014). QOL in the psychological domain was significantly poorer in early symptomatic (12.1) (p< 0.05) and AIDS patients (12.4) (p< 0.006) as compared to asymptomatic individuals (14.2). A significant difference in QOL scores in the psychological domain was observed with respect to the educational status (p< 0.037) and income of patients (p< 0.048). Significantly better QOL scores in the physical (p< 0.040) and environmental domain (p< 0.017) were present with respect to the occupation of the patients. Patients with family support had better QOL scores in environmental domain.

CONCLUSIONS

In our study, QOL is associated with education, income, occupation, family support and clinical categories of the patients.