Living and Caring with HIV-AIDS in Metropolitan Area of Buenos Aires: Narratives of Illness and Medical Care among women

Abstract

INTRODUCTION: Medical and political interventions on women with HIV have historically been associated to their reproductive role, and focus on the institutionalization of a medical-technical model to prevent perinatal transmission. OBJECTIVES: To recover knowledge and practices, demands and strategies developed by women from a study on the experience of living and caring with HIV, focusing on the analysis of biographical reconstruction processes and medical care. METHODS: A qualitative research based on the narrative study was conducted. It included 12 in-depth interviews to HIV positive women who had become mothers after diagnosis or had been diagnosed during pregnancy, childbirth or puerperium. RESULTS: The process of recognizing herself as living with HIV, rather than a specific point in time, must be understood as a relational process with variable duration from which people can (or can not) put together a story and develop resources to reorganize and normalize life, to deal with the uncertainty and stigma, to learn about the disease and treatment, and to address and get in touch with health services and other institutions. CONCLUSIONS: It is necessary to build a critical approach that recognizes the complexity of experiences and the diversity of processes involved in the experience of living with and caring for HIV-AIDS.