Last night I got my acceptance letter into the UCF Nursing Program. I am pretty excited that I got in, it really makes my life easier (in the sense that I don't have to try to find an alternative degree or school). Now that I am working on assignments for this class it makes me wonder how often I will run into HIV/AIDS in my nursing career. I am also interested to see if those patients will be treated differently by the hospital staff. I remember one of the women on the panel saying how a dermatologist refused to touch her. I hope that the hospital will be the one place where HIV/AIDS patients can go and know that the staff is knowledgeable enough to not discriminate. According to AVERT.org, "people with HIV can experience stigma and discrimination such as being refused medicines or access to facilities, receiving HIV testing without consent, and a lack of confidentiality. Such responses are often fueled by ignorance of HIV transmission routes amongst doctors, midwives, nurses and hospital staff." (AVERT, 2011) So, it sounds like there is still some progress to be made, and hopefully I will be able to educate my fellow staff so that those stigmas can be eliminated. Then, maybe the hospital will become a place where HIV/AIDS patients will know that they will receive help and not discrimination. I imagine it most be humiliating and hurtful to have hospital staff treat you different or be afraid of you.
AVERT. (2011).
HIV & AIDS stigma and discrimination. Retrieved March 30, 2011, from
http://www.avert.org/hiv-aids-stigma.htm
Did You Know?
Initially, I was interested in finding HIV/AIDS data on Afghanistan; however, interestingly enough, UNAIDS did not have any available information. That is shocking and disheartening. It must be pretty nasty over there if organizations that are completely neutral and just want to help are not allowed access. So, I decided to look at one of the United State's neighboring countries, Mexico. Currently, there are 220,000 people that have HIV, with an HIV prevalence rate of 0.3% (UNAIDS, 2009). According to UNAIDS there are no children that have HIV, and of the 220,000 adults, there are 59,000 women that have HIV (2009). It is estimated that there have been 6,400 - 12,000 deaths caused by HIV/AIDS (UNAIDS, 2009). This is another country where there are more men than women with HIV. The trend in Africa was for the majority of infected individuals to be women, however in China and Mexico it has been the opposite. It makes me think that women have very few rights in Africa and must be treated poorly.
References:
UNAIDS. (2009). Mexico. Retrieved March 16, 2011, from http://www.unaids.org/en/regionscountries/countries/mexico
Congrats on getting accepted into the nursing program!!!!!!Thats so sad that information isnt offered on that disease there.
ReplyDelete-Lashawnda Casper
Awesome news about your acceptance letter! Very exciting! And there was absolutely no information about HIV in Afghanistan? That's really odd because there is information about other countries and HIV. I hope at some point they are allowed to help Afghanistan.
ReplyDeleteVictoria Brown
Congrats on getting accepted, I know that acceptance letter always warms the heart a little bit. I also agree that it is too bad that the stigma of HIV still exists even within medical professionals who should be much more sympathetic and knowledgeable about the disease. Unfortunately I think it will be a long time before we ever completely get rid of the stigma.
ReplyDelete-Alex Schaal
Congrats on getting accepted to Nursing School. I know that it is pretty hard to get into. I wish you the best of luck. I think that we are really bogged down in Afghanistan to even allow for humanitarian organizations to do the good that can possibly get done. They are concerned with getting bread and water not HIV at this time.
ReplyDelete-Haymanot Birra