Kashyap B, Bhalla P, Sharma A, Saini S
Department of Microbiology, Maulana Azad Medical College, New Delhi, India.
Int J STD AIDS. 2009 Oct;20(10):708-11. doi: 10.1258/ijsa.2009.009046.
The HIV pandemic has had a profound impact on the health and economic conditions of individuals, and people living with HIV/AIDS are faced with the task of maintaining optimal health status despite an increasing insult to their immune status. The aim of the present study was to study the profile of direct walk-in and referred patients attending the Integrated Counselling and Testing Centre (ICTC) of a tertiary care hospital, which may provide important clues to understanding the epidemiology of the disease in a particular region. The study included all the attendees of the ICTC referred from the hospital or direct walk-in from January 2007 to December 2007. Three rapid HIV tests were used and the samples showing positive results in all the three tests were declared HIV positive. The results were analysed to correlate between HIV positivity, age, sex, route of transmission and direct walk-in/referred patients. A low proportion of ICTC attendees (27%) in our study were direct walk-ins. As regards HIV positivity, 312 (8.3%) out of 2440 males and 164 (4.3%) out of 1315 females were HIV positive. Among the referred HIV-positive patients 162 were males and 62 females, whereas among the direct walk-in HIV-positive patients, 150 were males and 102 females. Integrated counselling and testing is now seen as a key entry point for HIV prevention. In addition to scaling up ICTC services, it is also important to raise awareness by aggressive health education programmes and integration of ICTC into various community organizations.
艾滋病毒大流行对个人的健康和经济状况产生了深远影响，感染艾滋病毒/艾滋病的人面临着尽管免疫状况不断受到损害但仍要维持最佳健康状态的任务。本研究的目的是研究一家三级医院综合咨询与检测中心（ICTC）直接前来就诊和转诊患者的情况，这可能为了解特定地区该疾病的流行病学提供重要线索。该研究纳入了2007年1月至2007年12月期间从医院转诊至ICTC或直接前来就诊的所有患者。使用了三种快速艾滋病毒检测方法，在所有三种检测中呈阳性结果的样本被判定为艾滋病毒阳性。对结果进行分析，以关联艾滋病毒阳性、年龄、性别、传播途径以及直接前来就诊/转诊患者之间的关系。在我们的研究中，ICTC的就诊者中直接前来就诊的比例较低（27%）。关于艾滋病毒阳性情况，2440名男性中有312名（8.3%）艾滋病毒呈阳性，1315名女性中有164名（4.3%）艾滋病毒呈阳性。在转诊的艾滋病毒阳性患者中，男性有162名，女性有62名；而在直接前来就诊的艾滋病毒阳性患者中，男性有150名，女性有102名。综合咨询与检测现在被视为艾滋病毒预防的关键切入点。除了扩大ICTC服务外，通过积极的健康教育项目提高认识以及将ICTC融入各种社区组织也很重要。
