Health related quality of life and inmunologic parameters in women infected by human immunodeficiency virus

This paper relates immunological parameters to quality of life related to health (HRQOL) of women infected with Human Immunodeficiency Virus (HIV) attending the HIV/AIDS-STI program in Zulia state. In 50 women infected with HIV/AIDS, the HRQL questionnaire SF-36 was applied in order to determine physical and mental health and the viral load and CD4 cell count were quantified. The majority of women with HIV/AIDS had high scores in both their HRQOL (95.49 +/- 34.39) and physical health (36.37 +/- 16.16) and mental health (56.08 +/- 17.46), and low or undetectable viral load (60%) and CD4 cell count > 500 cells/mm3 (52%). There was a significant relationship between HRQL and viral load (p < 0.05), showing that patients with very high viral load (> 100000 copies) or CD4 below 200 cells/mm3 have a significant risk (p < 0.05) of 7 times more likely to have altered their HRQOL (OR [95% CI] = 6.80 [1.082 to 42.732] and 7.45 [1.895 to 29.341], respectively). We concluded that HIV-positive women showed good HRQL and adequate immune status, there was an association between HRQOL and these immune parameters.