As dificuldades de adaptação do convívio social de pacientes portadores de HIV/AIDS

Quantitative study of a descriptive nature undertaken at Unidade de Referencia em Doencas Infecciosas Preveniveis da Faculdade de Medicina do ABC designed to evaluate the prejudices that still exist in relation to HIV or AIDS patients, as well as their reasons and to investigate the difficulties in social adaptation of those patients. The sample comprised 20 HIV/AIDS patients seen from the Reference Unit and for data collection used a questionnaire. Most (11, 55%) of respondents reported an impact on their lives after the discovery of HIV seropositivity, usually in social life (friends, family and health services). It was found that the lack of knowledge about the disease is a factor of prejudice. In this study we could confirm the existence of prejudice related to HIV-positive patients, even after three decades of the first occurrence of HIV/AIDS.