Latinos and HIV/AIDS: Examining Factors Related to Disparity and Identifying Opportunities for Psychosocial Intervention Research

Abstract

Latinos maintain an AIDS case rate more than 3 times higher than whites, a greater rate of progression to AIDS, and a higher rate of HIV/AIDS-related deaths. Three broad areas are reviewed related to these disparities: (1) relevant demographic, socioeconomic, and socio-cultural factors among Latinos; (2) drug abuse and mental health problems in Latinos relevant to HIV/AIDS outcomes; and (3) opportunities for psychosocial intervention. Latinos living with HIV are a rapidly growing group, are more severely impacted by HIV than whites, and confront unique challenges in coping with HIV/AIDS. A body of research suggests that depression, substance abuse, treatment adherence, health literacy, and access to healthcare may be fruitful targets for intervention research in this population. Though limited, the current literature suggests that psychosocial interventions that target these factors could help reduce HIV/AIDS disparities between Latinos and whites and could have important public health value.

Spanish-speaking patients’ satisfaction with clinical pharmacists’ communication skills and demonstration of cultural sensitivity

“…43,44 As of 2010, the U.S. Congress has been committed to eliminating inequalities in health through the creation of the National Center on Minority Health and Health Disparities. The research agenda of the NCMHD is geared toward addressing and improving healthcare outcomes and eliminating health disparities in the U.S. 43 Similarly in Texas, the Task Force on Health Disparities was established by Texas legislature in…”

“…Kindness, or simpatía, is a welldocumented cultural normative value of Spanish-speaking patients. 13,41,42 Gonzalez et al 43 found that kindness was an especially important factor in the HIV patient-provider relationship. To our knowledge, no satisfaction studies with Spanish-speaking patients utilized an item that measured kindness (simpatía); however, Sleath et al 22 measured the importance of pharmacy employees being "nice," where 59.1 percent of Latino patients rated this quality was "very important."…”

“…Personalismo, or friendliness, is an established cultural value for Spanish speakers in the U.S. 13,43 Case studies emphasized personalismo and found that the lack of friendliness was detrimental to the continuity of care for Spanish speakers. 14 A study conducted by Baker et al 39 reported that satisfaction with friendliness was lower for Spanish-speaking patients who did not have language-concordant providers (p<0.001).…”

“…Familismo refers to the overall importance of honoring the decisions of the family as a whole versus the decisions of one individual in the family, 13 and the importance of familismo in Latino patients with HIV, schizophrenia, and cancer have been addressed. 38,43,44 Ayanian et al utilized a "psychosocial care" construct item that measured whether patients believed there was enough involvement of family and friends with healthcare. On average, Latino patients reported more problems with "psychosocial care" than white patients (p<0.01).…”

Estimates of the Population Prevalence of Injection Drug Users among Hispanic Residents of Large US Metropolitan Areas

“…6,7 This bias may be somewhat balanced by the likelihood that IAIDS data overrepresents Hispanics, as a result of their greater likelihood to progress to AIDS, once HIV-infected 40 ; however, there are few data available to test this. CTS data represent only a small proportion of all HIV tests done in the USA and can include results for individuals tested more than once.…”