Adherence to the treatment: Experiences of adolescents with HIV/AIDS

The arrival of the antiretroviral therapy has increased the patients’ survival with HIV/AIDS. People who have acquired HIV in childhood, through vertical transmission or other means, get to adolescence and start to face the conflicts characteristic of this moment of life. These conflicts worsen when associate to an incurable chronic condition, as AIDS, in which is necessary periodic health follow, with medical appointments and daily use of drugs, what is permeated by stigma and discrimination. It is a descriptive-exploratory study, with qualitative methodological approach, which aimed to understand the adherence process of adolescents with HIV/AIDS to treatment, and identify the causes that can lead to non-adherence. The subjects were nine adolescents in use of antiretroviral therapy, who acquired HIV during childhood and are under follow-up at the university hospital in Brazil, as well as the responsible for the adolescents. The study showed us the adolescents try to live and feel normal, as other people of their age. However, there is still much prejudice in society in relation to HIV/AIDS, what makes them live the dilemma of revealing or not their serologic status and, many times, when they reveal it, they suffer with the discrimination and stigma. Their caregivers still long for cure and mention fear of losing the adolescents, as they have been through similar situations before. The adolescents dream of a future, including marriage and children. These facts influence in the adherence to treatment and the difficulty in taking medications, for the unpleasant taste, the memory of the disease or for thinking that it can lead them to death, as if it was the solution for their problems. The adolescents know the importance and benefits of antiretrovirals.. The results of the study enabled the identification of aspects which need intervention, aiming a better adherence to treatment.