Impairment of nutritional, educational status and quality of life among children infected with and belonging to families affected by human immunodeficiency virus/acquired immune deficiency syndrome

The human immunodeficiency virus (HIV) epidemic has ramified impact on family members of people living with the disease, especially in vulnerable groups such as children, which has been neglected while addressing the overt burden in infected individuals. The objectives of this study were to evaluate the impact of HIV on the nutritional and educational status in HIV-infected and -affected children and to compare quality of life (QoL) in these children with controls. A cross-sectional controlled study was conducted among children aged 5-11 years. HIV-infected children and children accompanying parents seeking treatment in an antiretroviral treatment (ART) centre were sampled. Controls were obtained from the field practice area of a teaching hospital. A semi-structured questionnaire and anthropometric measures were used to evaluate the impact on the nutritional and educational status. The General Health Assessment for Children (GHAC) instrument was used to measure QoL. Thirty-eight infected children, 149 children living with family members infected with HIV and 200 controls were sampled. The mean age was 8.55 +/- 1.78, with 203 male children and 184 female children. The mean nutritional Z-scores were impacted in the affected and infected groups and significant differences were obtained on the domains of educational status on a proportions test. Most QoL domains were affected and the significance was retained in multivariate regression analysis after controlling for sociodemographic factors. HIV-infected and -affected children have poorer outcome on nutritional and educational indicators with impaired QoL. Identifying and defining vulnerability in these children can help mitigate the wider impact of HIV.