October 10, 2007

Women Aren’t Talking Treatment With Their Docs

According to data obtained from the Women Living Positive Survey, 55 percent of women living with HIV have not discussed with their health care provider the ways that living with the virus affects them differently than men, including their treatment options and personal needs, especially around pregnancy. Each year, 6,000 HIV-positive women in the United States give birth, and the majority of the 300,000 women living with HIV in the U.S. are of childbearing age.

“We hope the survey findings will encourage discussion between women and their health care providers about HIV medications that best meet their individual needs,” says Dawn Averitt Bridge, founder and chair of the board of directors of the Well Project, which developed the survey with Boehringer Ingelheim Pharmaceuticals, Inc. “The good news is the survey found that when these types of conversations happened, the majority of women were satisfied and comfortable with the experience.”

Of the women who reported discussing treatment differences between men and women, an overwhelming 96 percent reported satisfactory answers from their health care provider.