Evaluation of the factors that affect adherence to Anti-Retroviral Therapy in HIV-Positive Clients at Comboni Hospital Kyamuhunga Bushenyi Uganda

Abstract

HIV is a global public health issue. In 2015 an estimated 36.7 million people were living with HIV including 1.8 million children. The majority of this number lives in low and middleincome countries. In the same year, 1.1 million people died of AIDS-related illnesses. Antiretroviral therapy (ART) has been shown to delay the progression of AIDS, resulting in a greater and more sustained virologic and immunologic response and improve survival. The study was a descriptive cross-sectional study, involving HIV patients on ART attending Comboni Hospital Kyamuhunga from 12st to 30th June 2017. The study aimed at understanding factors associated with poor adherence to ART among HIV-positive patients attending Comboni Hospital Kyamuhunga. Out of the 57 clients, 41(71.9%) had good adherence, and 16(28.10%) had poor adherence to Antiretroviral therapy. Forgetting accounted for (27)47% of the poor adherence, travel problems accounted for (14)25%, drug stock-outs (7)12%, and stigma, disclosure or privacy issues accounted for (9)16%. Despite results showing that most patients had good adherence, a significant number still had poor adherence to Antiretroviral therapy, the most common contributor to poor adherence being forgetting their doses and travel problems. There is a need to strengthen continuous monitoring of both adherence and correlating it with the clinical outcomes of the clients. This will create an interactive feedback mechanism that could lead to optimal clinical states and improved quality of life of clients. Keywords: HIV/AIDS, Antiretroviral therapy, Stigma, Drug stock out, Poor adherence, Comboni Hospital.