I want to be like the others - Waverley Care

I want to be like the othersthat fear of rejection and loss of control over their diagnosis may lead many youngpeople to decide against disclosing their HIV status to a partner or friend (Ely, 2008).The European Collaborative Study identifies that whilst telling children about theirHIV status has always been difficult for parents and for children, HAART mayencourage parents to disclose at an earlier stage, in an attempt to improveadherence to treatment and in answer to questions from the child (Thorne et al,2002). Non-compliance to medical treatment is known to be a common problem forchildren with chronic illness, particularly when they reach the potentially rebelliousteenage years (c.f. Drotar, 2000; Logan et al, 2003). Ely’s (2008) study of ‘lookedafter’ children suggests that adherence to medication is likely to be particularly poorduring adolescence, as young people at this time make active choices about notwanting to take their medication, or they find it difficult to maintain the strict regime astheir lifestyles become less predictable. Looking ahead, it is not clear whether earlierdisclosure will lead to more or less psychological and psycho-social difficulties forchildren and young people. The evidence from other studies of disclosure, forexample in relation to adoption in childhood, indicate that children who grow upknowing are less likely to experience extreme upset during adolescence (Triseliotis,1973; Triseliotis, Shireman and Hundleby, 1997). It remains to be seen whether thesame will be true of children with HIV.We have touched here on another key area of research attention, that is, the effectsof HIV on children’s psychological and psycho-social functioning. It is known thatchildhood and adolescence is a time of major change in children’s lives,psychologically, socially and emotionally (Rutter and Taylor, 2002). Moreover, it iswidely documented that chronic illness is a risk factor for children’s psychologicaladjustment (e.g. Eiser, 1990). The additional impact which HIV brings is less certain.An early study from the United States suggested that HIV-infected children werelikely to have learning and language difficulties, indicating that they required specialeducational provision (Papola et al, 1994). Eight years later and in marked contrast,Thorne et al (2002) found that most of the children in their European cohort were inmainstream school, with only a small minority having special educational needs.They suggest that this may be explained by the very different social background ofthe children in each research project,5confirming that the socio-economic5 Research evidence in relation to adults’ experiences confirms this. Anderson andWeatherburn (2004) conducted a large-scale survey of 1,821 people living with HIV in the UK.This identified that although some people with HIV were coping well with minimum unmet99