Attitudes of Health Care Professionals towards people living with HIV
Research type
Research Study
Full title
Exploring the implicit and explicit attitudes of Health Care Professionals’ towards people living with HIV in a low HIV-prevalence society
IRAS ID
141834
Contact name
Nigel Lyttle
Contact email
Sponsor organisation
Belfast Health and Social Care Trust
Duration of Study in the UK
0 years, 4 months, 30 days
Research summary
This study aims to explore attitudes of health professionals towards people living with HIV in Northern Ireland. This study is interested in how professional’s attitudes influence how they think and feel about people with HIV. Furthermore, the study is interested in what factors influence these attitudes, such as age, knowledge and experience. Medical, nursing and midwifery staff, speech and language therapists, occupational therapists and physiotherapists within the Belfast Health and Social Care Trust are invited to take part in the study. Emails will be sent to clinical leads requesting them to forward an invitation to staff. The study will also be advertised on the Trust website and at staff training.
Participants will be asked to provide demographic information and fill in two questionnaires relating to attitudes to HIV(AIDS-Attitude-Scale) and knowledge of HIV(Brief HIV-Knowledge-Questionnaire). Participants will be asked to rate their attitudes towards two other conditions, Leukaemia and Chlamydia, which will be used as comparisons. Participants will complete two online experiments which involve sorting words into categories; this experiment aims to assess thoughts about HIV that exist outside of conscious awareness. Responses will be anonymous and participation should take approximately 30minutes.
There is extensive research on health professional’s attitudes towards people living with HIV; however there has been no such research in Northern Ireland. Although HIV-stigma is a global phenomenon it takes on diverse forms in different cultural contexts, therefore application of current literature to Northern Ireland is limited. An investigation into factors impacting on psychological wellbeing of people living with HIV, such as attitudes of health professionals, may provide an avenue for preventing avoidable ill-health, both psychological and physical, through appropriate early, consistent and unbiased care. If the presence of stigma towards people living with HIV goes unrecognised or underestimated, there will be resultant negative impact on health outcomes.
REC name
HSC REC A
REC reference
14/NI/1131
Date of REC Opinion
10 Dec 2014
REC opinion
Further Information Favourable Opinion