The Approach of Infectious Diseases Physicians to Patients Infected with HIV in Turkey; Socrates Study

• Main Authors: Yeşim YILDIZ, Yakup DEMİR, Meryem Merve ÖREN, Ömer KARAŞAHİN, İrem AKDEMİR KALKAN, Tuba DAL, Merve AYHAN, Mustafa Kemal ÇELEN
• Format: Article
• Language: English
• Published: Bilimsel Tip Yayinevi 2021-03-01
• Series: Flora Infeksiyon Hastalıkları ve Klinik Mikrobiyoloji Dergisi
• Subjects: hiv/aids; physician; knowledge
• Online Access: http://www.floradergisi.org/managete/fu_folder/2021-01/196-207%20Yesim%20Yildiz.pdf

Introduction: In Turkey, the number of infected people with HIV-1 increased five-fold between the years 2011-2018. In 2019, 20202 HIV-infected individuals and 1786 AIDS patients were reported. It is necessary to update the physicians’ knowledge on medical, ethical, legal and social issues about HIV infected patients, and to increase the number of physicians following these patients. In this study, it was aimed to determine the problems experienced by infectious diseases and clinical microbiology (IDCM) physicians on diagnosis, treatment and follow-up and to increase their awareness. Materials and Methods: In the study, a questionnaire with 39 questions was sent to 400 IDCM physicians via e-mail. The results of 131 physicians in total were analyzed. In statistical comparison, chi-square test was used for categorical data, and p value below 0.05 was accepted as statistically significant in 95% confidence interval. SPSS v 21.0 program was used for statistical analysis. Results: Of the 131 physicians who participated in the study, 89 (67.9%) were females, 75.6% of these physicians stated that they follow HIV-infected patients. Average working durations of the physicians who followed and did not follow the patients were 16.0 ± 10.4 (1-44) and 11.9 ± 5.6 (2-26) years, respectively. Of the 32 physicians who did not follow the patients, 22 (68.8%) stated that they wanted to follow patients on provided conditions. The most common reasons for physicians not following HIV-infected patients are lack of access to laboratory tests (56.3% n= 18) and inadequate hospital/outpatient conditions (50.0% n= 16). Of the 99 physicians who follow HIV-infected patients, 87 (87.8%) can access all diagnostic tests, and 98 physicians (98.9%) can access at least one. The most commonly found difficulties in patient follow-up are the lack of social insurance of the patient (43.4%) and informing relatives about the disease (37.4%). Seventy-two point seven percent of the physicians have difficulties in the management of the patient group (mental disorder, drug addiction and prisoners) who has social problems. Physician-patient compliance (96%), drug posology (79.8%) and insurance problems (79.8%) were found to be the leading factors affecting treatment compliance. Conclusion: The most challenging issues of physicians following HIV-infected patients are the follow-up of patients without social insurance and the management of socially problematic patients. The most common reasons for physicians not following these patients are inaccessibility to laboratory tests and insufficient hospital conditions. Our study outputs will contribute to the education plans of infectious diseases physicians in our country. Increasing physician patient compliance is important in combating this disease.