Social Representations, Vulnerability and Religious Beliefs of the Elderly About HiV/AidS: an integrative Review

Introduction: sexuality in later life needs to be discussed because of the significant increase of the HIV/AIDS virus in this population segment. Objective: recognizing what has been published about the social representations, vulnerability and religious beliefs of older people about HIV/AIDS. Method: an integrative review study of literature inserted into the virtual portals: LILACS, MEDLINE, SciELO and BDENF. There were used as descriptors: "vulnerability", "HIV", "elder", "religion". The data collection instrument included: article title, objective, level of evidence, year, country, publishing journal, methodological approach of the study, data collection technique and the main results. There were met 242 published titles, and 17 articles were about the purpose and were distributed among national and international journals. Results: the social representations about HIV/AIDS were linked to cultural issues, educational, behavioral, religious. The reasons for vulnerability to the virus were multifactorial. Religious beliefs influenced the construction of social representations and perception of forms of vulnerability to HIV/AIDS. Conclusion: it needs to change some existing concepts among seniors about social representations, vulnerability and beliefs of HIV/AIDS.