Journal of urban health : bulletin of the New York Academy of Medicine
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To characterize the circumstances surrounding initiation of injecting drug use, data were collected from 229 young, recently initiated injection drug users enrolled through community-based recruitment in Baltimore, Maryland. Gender differences in the pattern of initiation, the number of persons present at initiation, risky injection, and sexual behaviors at initiation, as well as behaviors after initiation, were examined. Overall, men and women were similar statistically with respect to age at initiation (19.5 years) and risk behaviors at initiation. ⋯ Persons who self-initiated had a lower HIV prevalence and fewer HIV-related risk behaviors. Analysis of variance assessed differences in the HIV risk profiles of female and male IDUs who were initiated by someone of the same sex, of the opposite sex, or who self-initiated. These results indicated that (1) young women and men had similar patterns of injection initiation; (2) most women were initiated by female friends, running counter to earlier literature claims that women were initiated to injection drug use by male sex partners; and (3) women initiated by men had a marginally greater mean score on the HIV risk profile.
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The objective was to evaluate the association between antiretroviral therapy and AIDS mortality in New York City (NYC). Design was a population-based case-control study. We randomly selected 150 case patients and 150 control patients whose AIDS diagnosis was made during 1994 to 1996 (male:female, 2:1) from among 19,238 persons reported to the NYC Health Department HIV/AIDS Reporting System (HARS). ⋯ Prescription of combination therapy other than HAART in 1996 and baseline CD4 count were also associated with survival, but less strongly so. The survival benefit of HAART extends beyond the confines of a few highly selected patients into the "real world," reducing AIDS deaths at the population level. This population-based study supports the likelihood that the introduction of HAART in 1996 played a primary role in the decline in NYC AIDS mortality.
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The concept of slow virus diseases was developed by Sigurdsson in the 1950s in studies of infections of Icelandic sheep, including Visna, a slow (lenti) viral infection of the central nervous system. Human immunodeficiency virus (HIV) belongs to the same lentivirus subfamily of retroviruses and causes significant dysfunction of all levels of the nervous system. ⋯ As a consequence, major disabilities in the chronic-treated phase of the HIV epidemic may include cognitive impairment, gait disorders, and various pain syndromes. Policy planning will need to take into account the long-term residential, social, and health care needs of this population.
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Randomized Controlled Trial Clinical Trial
A randomized field trial of ACINDES: a child-centered training model for children with chronic illnesses (asthma and epilepsy).
A randomized field trial of a child-centered model of training for self-management of chronic illnesses was conducted of 355 Spanish-speaking school-aged children, between 6 and 15 years old, with moderate to severe asthma and epilepsy, in Buenos Aires, Argentina. The model, based on play techniques, consists of five weekly meetings of 8-10 families, with children's and parents' groups held simultaneously, coordinated by specially trained teachers and outside the hospital environment. Children are trained to assume a leading role in the management of their health; parents learn to be facilitators; and physicians provide guidance, acting as counselors. Group activities include games, drawings, stories, videos, and role-playing. Children and parents were interviewed at home before the program and 6 and 12 months after the program, and medical and school records were monitored for emergency and routine visits, hospitalizations, and school absenteeism. In asthma and epilepsy, children in the experiment showed significant improvements in knowledge, beliefs, attitudes, and behaviors compared to controls (probability of experimental gain over controls = .69 for epilepsy and .56 for asthma, with sigma2 = .007 and .016, respectively). Parent participants in the experiment had improved knowledge of asthma (39% before vs. 58% after) and epilepsy (22% before vs. 56% after), with a probability of gain = .62 (sigma2 = .0026) with respect to the control group. Similar positive outcomes were found in fears of child death (experimental 39% before vs. 4% after for asthma, 69% before vs. 30% after for epilepsy), as well as in disruption of family life and patient-physician relationship, while controls showed no change. Regarding clinical variables, for both asthma and epilepsy, children in the experimental group had significantly fewer crises than the controls after the groups (P = .036 and P = .026). Visits to physicians showed a significant decrease for those with asthma (P = .048), and emergency visits decreased for those with epilepsy (P = .046). An 18-item Children Health Locus of Control Scale (CHLCS) showed a significant increase in internality in experimental group children with asthma and epilepsy (P < .01), while controls did not change or performed worse 12 months after the program. School absenteeism was reduced significantly for those with asthma and epilepsy (for the group with asthma, fall/winter P = .006, and spring P = .029; for the group with epilepsy, P = .011). ⋯ The program was successful in improving the health, activity, and quality of life of children with asthma and epilepsy. The data suggested that an autonomous (Piagetian) model of training is a key to this success, reinforcing children's autonomous decision making.