The purpose of this study was to evaluate the prevalence of depressive symptoms and associated variables among people living with HIV/AIDS (PLWHA) in a specialized treatment center in a city located in southern Brazil. A cross-sectional study was conducted using the Beck Depression Inventory to assess the presence of depressive symptoms. The prevalence of depressive symptoms was 53.5% among the surveyed population, which supports the idea that depressive symptoms are more common among PLWHA, mainly if compared with the general population. It was observed that 57.7% of the study participants were with depressive symptoms and did not take any psychiatric medication and 100% did not undergo psychotherapy, which indicates undertreatment. There was no statistically significant difference in the mean CD4 count between patients with depressive symptoms (484.1  ±  353) and patients without depressive symptoms (528.4  ±  263). Further actions should be taken to improve the care for PLWHA. The interface between psychology, psychiatry, and internal medicine is of utmost importance to provide a more humanized care, in which the psychosocial, psychological, and psychiatric aspects are not neglected.

CHA demonstrated little knowledge on HPV, which may affect their work as multipliers in the prevention of diseases and in education in health.

Abstract

The objective of this study was to conduct the initial stages of the cross-cultural adaptation to Brazilian Portuguese of a scale to measure the level of knowledge about HPV. The stages included: translation from English into the Portuguese spoken in Brazil; synthesis of the translated version; back-translation; analysis by an expert committee; and reliability analysis based on internal consistency and reproducibility. Cronbach's α coefficient for the instrument was 0.985. Subset analysis produced only minor variations. The correlation coefficients between the individual items and the overall result showed strong positive correlations, except for three items. Reproducibility analysis showed kappa values with substantial or moderate agreement for the majority of the items. A preliminary Brazilian version was obtained with satisfactory results, but other stages are necessary in the process of validation of the Brazilian version.

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