Facors Influencing Quality of Life among HIV-Infected/ AIDS Patients at Community Hospitals in Nakhon Ratchasima Province

The objectives of this cross-sectional descriptive study were to measure quality of life (QOL) and to examine factors influencing the QOL among HIV-infected/AIDS patients at community hospitals in Nakhon Ratchasima province. Data were collected during 1-31 March, 2010 from 360 outpatients who HIV-infected/AIDS patients receiving antiretroviral therapy at 24 community hospitals in Nakhon Ratchasima province. Their age ranged from 23-44 years old and were able to write and read Thai. The patients had followed-up at hospital for at least three months continuously. The questionnaire had five parts including Simplified Medication Adherence Questionnaire (SMAQ) (α=0.86), HIV-related symptoms questionnaire (α=0.89), Self-care behavior questionnaire (α=0.80), Social support questionnaire (α=0.84), and WHOQOL-BREF-THAI (α=0.87) which was the QOL measurement. QOL measurement was classified into four domains including physical, psychological, social relationships and environmental domain. Patient socio-demographics, health and treatment, self-care behavior and social support were factors that were explored the association with patients QOL by using Multiple Regression Analysis (MRA). The results showed that the total QOL score of HIV-infected/AIDS patients was moderate level. There were a significant relationship between at least one variable in patient socio-demographics, health and treatment, self-care behavior and social support with the total QOL score in this model (r=0.607, p=0.000). The variance within the predictors could explain 36.8% of variance within the total QOL score. The social support overall score had significantly largest positive correlation with total QOL score (β=0.387, p<0.01). Self-care behavior overall score had significantly positive correlation with total QOL score (β=0.100, p<0.05). It was also found that HIV-related symptoms score, hospital non-participated holistic care center and non-club at HIV/AIDS clinic and widowed/disvorced/separated had significantly negative correlation with total QOL score (β= -0.226, -0.134, -0.097 with p<0.01, p<0.01, p<0.05), respectively. The results presented the QOL of HIV-infected/AIDS patients receiving antiretroviral therapy at community hospitals in Nakhon Ratchasima province and its influencing factore. The results could be used for healthcare service development to promote supportive factors in order to improve better QOL for the patients.