Document 2046
 DOCN  M94A2046
 TI    Skills training for people with HIV: does it help people to cope.
 DT    9412
 AU    Baggaley R; Zulu W; Muluti J; Macmillan M; Kelly M; Godfrey-Faussett P;
       Kara-Zambart Project, Lusaka, Zambia.
 SO    Int Conf AIDS. 1994 Aug 7-12;10(1):393 (abstract no. PD0179). Unique
       Identifier : AIDSLINE ICA10/94370529
 AB    BACKGROUND: A skills training scheme for people with HIV was set up in
       1992. The scheme offered training in various artistic skills as well as
       group and individual counselling and HIV education. OBJECTIVES: 1. To
       establish why people joined the scheme. 2. To determine whether the
       training was relevant to their needs. 3. To ascertain their future
       plans. 4. To find out whether the project had helped them to cope with
       their positive status. METHOD: All the trainees on the scheme in
       November 1993 were interviewed by a researcher trained in qualitative
       techniques. The interviews were conducted in vernacular languages and
       lasted between 30-120 minutes. RESULTS: All 32 participants agreed to be
       interviewed (19 female and 13 male). The men had joined because of
       unemployment, some having lost their jobs because of ill health or
       problems related to HIV. Many of the women joined because of death or
       ill health of their spouses and consequently a need for an income. All
       the participants enjoyed working on the training scheme. The majority of
       the participants wished to use the skills they had learnt to start small
       businesses but stated that it would be important to have loans and
       business advice. Although the group is for people with HIV 40% of the
       group had difficulties acknowledging their status at the start of the
       course but by the end they were all able to talk about their HIV freely
       with in the group. Many participants still found it extremely difficult
       to talk about their HIV status outside the group and said how important
       it was to meet in a place where you were accepted and where HIV was not
       treated as a stigma. Although most of the men had been able to talk to
       someone about being HIV positive only 2 had been able to share this with
       their regular sexual partner. 11 of the women had told their partners (5
       women were widowed and had no current sexual partner). 3 women and no
       men felt able to go public and help others by becoming peer educators.
       CONCLUSIONS: 1. Although the participants were enthusiastic about the
       training they felt it would be wasted unless linked to a loan scheme
       enabling them to start up businesses. 2. HIV remains a very stigmatised
       condition in Zambia and although many of the participants had been able
       to acknowledge their status following the course many had no one they
       could turn to for support and expressed a need for continuing contact
       with a counsellor from the centre.
 DE    Acquired Immunodeficiency Syndrome/PSYCHOLOGY/*REHABILITATION
       *Adaptation, Psychological  Adult  *Art  Female  Human  HIV
       Seropositivity/PSYCHOLOGY/REHABILITATION  Male  *Rehabilitation,
       Vocational  Sexual Partners  *Sick Role  Social Support  Truth
       Disclosure  *Vocational Education  Zambia  MEETING ABSTRACT

       SOURCE: National Library of Medicine.  NOTICE: This material may be
       protected by Copyright Law (Title 17, U.S.Code).