Développement et évaluation d’une intervention visant la prise optimale d’un traitement antirétroviral des personnes vivant avec le VIH

The key to the success of antiretroviral treatment is optimal treatment taking. At least 95% of prescribed antiretroviral treatments (ARV) have to be taken to achieve long-term suppression of viral replication and so restore and preserve immunologic functioning. However, people living with acquired immunodeficiency virus (PLHIV) have problems adopting and sustaining this level of medication taking over time. Although some interventions have demonstrated they can facilitate this behaviour, in Quebec there are no systematic interventions to support PLHIV in daily treatment taking. The goal of this study was to develop and evaluate an intervention to facilitate optimal antiretroviral-treatment-taking behaviour among people living with HIV. Development of the intervention was guided by an approach known as “intervention mapping.” Accordingly, the theoretical framework put forward by Godin and his colleagues (2005), which includes the factors of self-efficacy and attitudes, was used not only to predict and explain treatment-taking behaviour but also to develop the intervention. In the model, self-efficacy and attitudes are associated with a number of modifiable factors: social support, satisfaction with health professionals and not feeling adverse effects. The goal of the intervention was therefore the acquisition and mobilization of skills in order to affect these factors and, consequently, enhance self-efficacy and positive attitudes towards taking one’s ARV treatment, thus facilitating the desired behaviour. The individualized intervention was structured as four 45- to 75-minute meetings held over a 12-week period with a nurse who had expertise in HIV. A randomized trial was conducted to evaluate the effect of the intervention on behaviour and on the explanatory variables. A self-administered questionnaire, viral load and CD4 count were used to measure the principal outcome variable. vi Measurements of the principal outcome and the explanatory variables were made before the intervention and at 12 weeks and at 24 weeks post-intervention. The sample comprised 51 people living with HIV who were being followed at a clinic in Montreal: 23 in the control group and 28 in the experimental group. Data were subjected to repeated measures analysis of variance (ANOVA). The intervention was found to have a positively trend (p = 0.056) in terms of achieving an undetectable viral load : 43.8 % more persons of the experimental group compared with the group control (78.6 % versus 34.8 %) had an undetectable viral load at 12 weeks and 32.8 % more at 24 weeks (89.3 % versus 56.5 %). Probably the lack of statistical power meant no significant effect was found on the explanatory variables, but the small increases observed in the experimental group are consistent with the theoretical model (Godin et al., 2005). This study contributes to knowledge by proposing an intervention to facilitate optimal antiretroviral-treatment taking among PLHIV.

Keyphrases: attitudes, intervention mapping, randomized trial, intervention development, optimal antiretroviral-treatment taking, adherence, management skills, self-efficacy, relations with health professionals, social support