Living And Ageing With HIV

Contributor
October 11, 2022

If you are among the population of people living with HIV, then the chances are you are over 50 and have lived with the virus for many years.

It also means that you are beginning to face some new challenges – those associated with ageing. But, while some of those challenges may be more pronounced for PLHIV, they don’t have to impact your quality of life.

Treatment and care for PLHIV have advanced exponentially in the four decades since the virus was first identified. Where once the prognosis was poor, people diagnosed with HIV today have a life-expectancy on par with people in the general community. Most people can be active and engaged with the community, participate in work, and make plans without being restricted by treatments or illness.

Studies show, however, that people who have lived with HIV for many years may be more susceptible to other physical ailments and are more likely to develop health problems associated with ageing, prolonged anxiety, and stigma. People over 50 might have experienced an initial climate of anxiety, blame, uncertainty, and hostility associated with the HIV pandemic.

Yet today, the health outcomes, opportunities, and potential for positive quality of life for PLHIV are very good and constantly getting better.

If you are a PLHIV over 50 it’s really important for you to develop and maintain a good relationship with your healthcare professional. Someone who not only knows your health history, but knows you, can partner with you in making choices that will improve your quality of life.

Good quality of life goes hand in hand with emotional health which can have an impact on your overall health. Emotional health can influence the decisions you make about seeking treatment and even seeking happiness. When you feel good about yourself, you are energised and more likely to actively participate in life.

Though quality of life is a subjective thing and different for everyone, there are ways to rate it comparatively. The PozQol Scale is a tool specifically designed to measure quality of life among PLHIV. Devised by PLHIV peer organisations, health and social researchers, and health industry partners, the tool consists of 13 questions, requiring a respondent to rank each one according to how strongly they agree. The statements cover four life domains: psychological, which includes mood, coping, hope for or fear of the future, and self-worth; social, which is about personal and social life and includes feelings of belonging, support, and social stigma; health concerns, which is about how someone feels about their own health and includes health-related worries and energy and how easy they find it to manage HIV and HIV treatment; functional, which is about whether a person feels that they can live what they would call a “normal” life, and includes independence, meaningful occupation, and good standard of living.

Together with your health care professional, you can use the tool to identify areas in your life that might need attention as you grow older with the condition.

The tool can be used repeatedly to track changes in your responses as you progress through various stages in life.

As you age, different factors will affect you more or less depending on what matters in life.

Using the PozQol Scale you can see where those changes occur and work with your healthcare professional to improve those areas of your life. The statements in the PozQol Scale address things like being in control, fear, loneliness, inclusion, finding enjoyment in life.

As humans, we all want to feel part of a community, have goals, plan for the future, be our best selves. Growing older shouldn’t diminish our desire or our ability to have all those things, and nor should living with HIV.

Sponsored by ViiV Healthcare