Case Study: Human Immunodeficiency Virus Infections and the Acquired Immunodeficiency Syndrome
The spread of human immunodeficiency virus (HIV) and of the Acquired Immunodeficiency Syndrome (AIDS) that results from prolonged exposure to the HIV virus is the most significant epidemiological occurrence of the latter part of the Twentieth Century. Changes in sexual behaviors in the 1960s and 1970s associated with the “sexual revolution” created a fertile societal environment for the spread of disease. In particular, male homosexuals were the segment of the population most significantly impacted by the infection in the years during which these diseases initially began to spread.
Praman M. is the son of parents who emigrated from Thailand to the Seattle area in the 1950s. Praman went to nursing school, and worked in a primary care setting before developing a desire to work with persons infected by HIV. He has spent the past four years employed at a facility that provides a range of medical and social service to persons living with HIV and AIDS. At this time, Praman has decided that he wants to go to work with an international non-profit that prides services to people living with HIV/AIDS in developing countries. He has agreed to join this organization and return to his ancestral homeland for a three-year service commitment working in a rural area some 200 miles from Bangkok.
- What are some of the differences in the type and timing of symptoms of both AIDS and AIDS-related opportunistic infections that Praman will encounter when he begins his work in Thailand?
- Many of the clients served by the agency Praman worked with in Seattle were homosexual males. In the area where he will be working in Thailand, many of the infected persons he will be working with are females who have spent time working in the commercial sex trade in tourist areas. What differences and similarities will he encounter in dealing with his new group of clients?
