Perceived Stress Levels Among HIV/AIDS-Infected Mothers: The Role of Over-the-Counter Products

Abstract

The purpose of this study was to identify correlates of perceived stress levels among 49 HIV/AIDS-infected mothers enrolled in a social services agency that provides HIV/AIDS support services in North Carolina. The author found in an Ordinary Least Squares regression analysis that the CD4 t-cell count, receipt of advice or support from church pastor, annual household income, and employed were all negatively related to seropositive mothers' perceived stress scores. Conversely, the need to have borrowed money from family members or friends to help pay for over-the-counter products like nutritional drinks, vitamins, or minerals was found to be positively related to these scores. The accessibility of these over-the-counter products could not only help to lower seropositive mothers' perceived stress levels but also potentially improve the functioning of their body's immune system. Implications for the Medicaid Program's prescription drug policy that excludes these over-the-counter products and prescription drug representatives are discussed.

A Self-Management Framework to Assess the Need for Nutritional Supplementation in People Living with HIV/AIDS

“…Mothers living with HIV/ AIDS may perceive the stress associated with their desire to overcome their adverse life situations caused by their disease as overwhelming and beyond their ability to be managed [43]. Ellis [8], in a sample of 49 mothers with HIV/AIDS, found that high perceived stress levels were associated with the need to borrow money from family members or friends to help acquire nutritional supplements. It is plausible that due to the toll of those stressors in those mothers' lives, they embarked upon this selfmanagement strategy to help replenish their lost CD4 T cells and build their body's immune system.…”

“…This can be a very stressful situation for a person living with HIV. Stress contributes to the depletion of CD4 T cells and, in the process, compromises the proper functioning of the body's immune system [8,9]. This unhealthy situation can give rise to an urgent need for nutritional supplementation.…”

“…Self-medicating with over-the-counter products such as nutritional supplements is one type of behavior seen in many people living with this disease to manage their mental challenges [7]. Psychological distress compromises the proper functioning of the body's immune system by contributing to the depletion of CD4 T cells [8,9].…”

The association of HIV and cocaine use to cigarette smoking in the context of depression and perceived stress

“…Physiological and immunological responses to stressful events arise from the individual's assessment of the event, its perceived stress, the actual event itself (Ellis, 2012) and adaptation to the stressor. Perceived stress, which is higher among PLWH (Williams et al, 2017) potentially due to the illness itself, as well as from legal, financial, work, poverty, homelessness, and others factors (Brown et al, 2019;Feng et al, 2015;Moskowitz et al, 2009), is related to many negative health outcomes (Cohen et al, 2007;Hand et al, 2006;Keiser et al, 2010;Lewis et al, 2015;Lopes et al, 2012;McIntosh & Rosselli, 2012;Owe-Larsson et al, 2009;Rubin et al, 2015;Weinstein & Li, 2016).…”