scholarly journals "I Heard He Got the Package": African American Men's Experiences of Living with HIV/AIDS

Author(s):  
Lisa Baumgartner

The purpose of this study was to investigate the experiences of African American men living with HIV/AIDS. The questions guiding the study were: (a) How do African American men incorporate HIV/AIDS into their identities? and (b) How do contexts affect the incorporation process? Data from this study was taken from a larger study concerning HIV/AIDS identity incorporation. Twelve self-identified African American men living with HIV/AIDS participated in 1.5-2 hour in-depth interviews. Participants traversed through a four or five step incorporation process. In addition, a disclosure process occurred. The contexts that influenced the incorporation process included the interpersonal context (e.g., support and stigma), sociocultural context, (e.g., race, class, sexual orientation), the temporal context (historical time), and situational context (e.g., a personal history of chemical dependency) (Ickovics, Thayaparan, & Ethier, 2001). These contexts intersected and affected participants’ integration of the HIV/AIDS identity into the self. Study findings have implications for HIV/AIDS educators and health professionals.

2006 ◽  
Vol 5 (1) ◽  
pp. 35-51 ◽  
Author(s):  
Aaron Buseh ◽  
Sheryl Kelber ◽  
Jeanne Hewitt ◽  
Patricia Stevens ◽  
Chang Park

Author(s):  
Seth C Kalichman ◽  
Renee El-Krab ◽  
Bruno Shkembi ◽  
Moira O Kalichman ◽  
Lisa A Eaton

Abstract The COVID-19 pandemic has had profound health and social impacts. COVID-19 also affords opportunities to study the emergence of prejudice as a factor in taking protective actions. This study investigated the association of COVID-19 concerns, prejudicial beliefs, and personal actions that involve life disruptions among people not living with and people living with HIV. 338 Black/African American men not living with HIV who reported male sex partners and 148 Black/African American men living with HIV who reported male sex partners completed a confidential survey that measured COVID-19 concern, COVID-19 prejudice, and personal action and institutionally imposed COVID-19 disruptions. Participants reported having experienced multiple social and healthcare disruptions stemming from COVID-19, including reductions in social contacts, canceling medical appointments, and inability to access medications. Mediation analyses demonstrated that COVID-19 concerns and COVID-19 prejudice were associated with personal action disruptions, indicating that these social processes are important for understanding how individuals modified their lives in response to COVID-19. It is imperative that public health efforts combat COVID-19 prejudice as these beliefs undermine investments in developing healthcare infrastructure to address COVID-19 prevention.


Author(s):  
Dan Royles

In the decades since it was identified in 1981, HIV/AIDS has devastated African American communities. Members of those communities mobilized to fight the epidemic and its consequences from the beginning of the AIDS activist movement. They struggled not only to overcome the stigma and denial surrounding a “white gay disease” in Black America, but also to bring resources to struggling communities that were often dismissed as too “hard to reach.” To Make the Wounded Whole offers the first history of African American AIDS activism in all of its depth and breadth. Dan Royles introduces a diverse constellation of activists, including medical professionals, Black gay intellectuals, church pastors, Nation of Islam leaders, recovering drug users, and Black feminists who pursued a wide array of grassroots approaches to slow the epidemic's spread and address its impacts. Through interlinked stories from Philadelphia and Atlanta to South Africa and back again, Royles documents the diverse, creative, and global work of African American activists in the decades-long battle against HIV/AIDS.


2016 ◽  
Vol 11 (2) ◽  
pp. 221-232 ◽  
Author(s):  
Barbara J. Blake ◽  
Gloria A. Jones Taylor ◽  
Richard L. Sowell

The HIV (human immunodeficiency virus) epidemic in the United States remains a serious public health concern. Despite treatment and prevention efforts, approximately 50,000 new HIV cases are transmitted each year. Estimates indicate that 44% of all people diagnosed with HIV are living in the southern region of the United States. African Americans represent 13.2% of the United States population; however, 44% (19,540) of reported new HIV cases in 2014 were diagnosed within this ethnic group. The majority of cases were diagnosed in men (73%, 14,305). In the United States, it is estimated that 21% of adults living with HIV are 50 years or older. There exists limited data regarding how well African American men are aging with HIV disease. The purpose of this study was to explore the perceptions and experiences of older African American men living with HIV in rural Georgia. Data were collected from 35 older African American men living with HIV using focus groups and face-to-face personal interviews. Qualitative content analysis revealed six overlapping themes: (1) Stigma; (2) Doing Fine, Most of the Time; (3) Coping With Age-Related Diseases and HIV; (4) Self-Care; (5) Family Support; and (6) Access to Resources. The findings from this study provide new insights into the lives of rural HIV-infected African American men, expands our understanding of how they manage the disease, and why many return to or remain in rural communities.


Author(s):  
Lisa Baumgartner

Individuals experience disease in a variety of contexts. In this study, I examined how the temporal context (e.g., historical time, social time, chronological age and the passage of time) affected the incorporation of the HIV/AIDS identity into the self. I used semi structured interviews to collect data from 36 individuals living with HIV/AIDS. Historical time did little to influence the initial reaction to the diagnosis. Chronological age shaped the initial reaction to the diagnosis for some participants. Social time affected immersion in the HIV/AIDS community and the passage of time influenced the integration of the HIV/AIDS identity into the self. The findings add depth to extant studies on the incorporation of the HIV/AIDS identity into the self.


Author(s):  
Jennifer Glaser

This chapter discusses the power of the medium of comics to shed light on discussions of race, racism, and the act of passing. Glaser moves from a close reading of Mat Johnson and Warren Pleece’s recent neo-passing narrative, the graphic novel Incognegro (2008), to a wider look at the history of visual media in representing racial violence during the twentieth and twenty-first centuries. This chapter makes the argument that comics provide an arena for thinking both about how we see and interpret race and how visual depictions of racial violence—from photographs of lynchings to recordings of police shootings of unarmed African American men—force us to grapple with complex ethical questions.


2019 ◽  
Vol 19 (1) ◽  
Author(s):  
Carly A. Rodriguez ◽  
Emiliano Valle ◽  
Jerome Galea ◽  
Milagros Wong ◽  
Lenka Kolevic ◽  
...  

Abstract Background The global HIV burden among adolescents ages 10–19 is growing. This population concurrently confronts the multifaceted challenges of adolescence and living with HIV. With the goal of informing future interventions tailored to this group, we assessed sexual activity, HIV diagnosis disclosure, combination antiretroviral therapy (cART) adherence, and drug use among adolescents living with HIV (ALHIV) in Lima, Peru. Methods Adolescents at risk or with a history of suboptimal cART adherence completed a self-administered, health behaviors survey and participated in support group sessions, which were audio recorded and used as a qualitative data source. Additionally, we conducted in-depth interviews with caregivers and care providers of ALHIV. Thematic content analysis was performed on the group transcripts and in-depth interviews and integrated with data from the survey to describe adolescents’ health related behaviors. Results We enrolled 34 ALHIV, of which 32 (14 male, 18 female, median age 14.5 years) completed the health behavior survey. Nine (28%) adolescents reported prior sexual intercourse, a minority of whom (44%) reported using a condom. cART adherence was highest in the 10–12 age group with 89% reporting ≤2 missed doses in the last month, compared to 36% in adolescents 13 years or older. Over 80% of adolescents had never disclosed their HIV status to a friend or romantic partner. Adolescents, caregivers, and health service providers described sexual health misinformation and difficulty having conversations about sexual health and HIV. Conclusions In this group of ALHIV, adherence to cART declined with age and condom use among sexually active adolescents was low. Multifactorial interventions addressing sexual health, gaps in HIV-related knowledge, and management of disclosure and romantic relationships are urgently needed for this population.


Author(s):  
Helen K. Black ◽  
John T. Groce ◽  
Charles E. Harmon

This chapter, as the conclusion to our book, is entitled Addressing the Silence. We went “behind the scenes” of our work to examine the research process and pondered various aspects of interviewing a coterie of African-American men. For example, why were our caregiving men so willing to discuss their experiences of caregiving? Were there topics within caregiving that men were reluctant to discuss? And, why did the methods of our research fit well with the subject of caregiving and with the communal history of our respondents? Although our research addressed the gap in the caregiving and gerontological literature about elderly African-American men, our respondents showed us how much more we need to learn from them. As men discussed their care work in the forum of the research interview, the role of the elder African-American male caregiver came out of the shadows, but not yet completely into the light.


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