HIV Cure & Treatment: Teen Patients Do Better When Parents Support Clinic Visits Says Study

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Teens with HIV fare well in dealing with the virus when they are accompanied by parents or guardian during their clinic visits, says Dr. Elizabeth Lowenthal of Children's Hospital of Philadelphia.

About 2.1 million adolescents in developing countries aged between 10 and 19 are living with HIV, reports Lowenthal and colleagues in a study published in JAMA Pediatrics. The researcher noted that children of this age group are less likely to adhere to the treatment regimen unlike young children or young adults, according to Reuters.

Lowenthal also said that the HIV medications are very complicated and there are only few government services in sub-Saharan Africa to support about 90 percent of HIV infected children and teens whose parents or guardians cannot take care of. She noted in an email to Reuters that, "When families and communities do not provide the support that a child needs, there are few options."

About 300 HIV positive adolescents coming in for check up at the Botswana-Baylor Children's Clinical Center of Excellence in the first quarter of 2012 were involved in a study by Lowenthal and his group. About three-fourth of the children were reported to have acquired the infection from their mothers either during pregnancy or delivery.

Nearly 50 children in the group had lost their parents while 70 children had mothers and 85 children had fathers to support them.  It was observed that 77 percent of children accompanied by their parent or guardian for check-up after three months had undetectable virus levels when compared to 57 percent of children who visited the clinic alone. At the end of six months, about 89 percent of children accompanied by a parent or a guardian had undetectable virus levels than 75 percent of children that showed up with no company.

Dr. William Moss, a professor of epidemiology at Johns Hopkins Bloomberg School of Public Health said that children that acquired HIV from mothers during delivery would have apparently lost their parents to the disease. He added that, "Adherence to a daily drug regimen for a life-long, chronic disease is challenging in the best of settings."

Moss also noted that, "As children transition to adolescence and strive for greater independence, the role of a supportive adult in the home remains critical to maintaining high levels of adherence while at the same time allowing the adolescent to take more responsibility for their own health," according to Reuters.   

Jennifer Dohrn, director of the office of global initiatives at Columbia University School of Nursing, in an email to Reuters noted that, "Now that this vulnerability for treatment failure has been identified, there are many ways to tackle how it can be prevented."