Factors influencing adherence to antiretroviral treatment among people living with HIV aged 15 - 60 years at Cité des Palmiers District Hospital, Cameroon

Abstract

Antiretroviral therapy (ART), essential for halting the progression of human immunodeficiency virus/acquired immunodeficiency syndrome (HIV/AIDS) infection and restoring immunity, should be taken regularly to be effective. This study aimed to assess the factors that may affect adherence to ART among people living with HIV (PLHIV) aged between 15 and 60 years at the Cité des Palmiers District Hospital. Thus, we conducted a descriptive and analytical cross-sectional study using a non-probabilistic, convenience survey. Data were collected using a questionnaire administered to PLHIV aged between 15 and 65 years (n=309). These factors affecting adherence were established by determining relative and absolute frequencies, and associations were estimated by calculating the odds ratios, confidence intervals, and P-values. Subsequently, 48.5% of participants were found to comply with ART and 51.5% were not. The independent predictors of poor adherence to ART were missed appointments at the HIV unit, occasional use of excitants/cigarettes, fear of disclosing HIV status, perceived limited opening hours of HIV-related services, discomfort with medication, recent initiation of treatment, and use of therapy reminders. Our study results are essential to orient public health policies and measures toward PLHIV non-adherents to ART treatment and mitigate the social, economic, and health impact of HIV threats on developing countries by focusing on good adherence.

Keywords

HIV / Antiretroviral therapy / Influencing factors / Therapeutic adherence / Cité des Palmiers

Acknowledgments

We would like to express our gratitude to the Institutional Ethics Committee of the School of Health Sciences of the Catholic University of Central Africa, and to the Director of the District Hospital of the Cité des Palmiers for the research authorizations granted. We would also like to thank the research participants for voluntarily agreeing to take part in this study.

Funding

None.

Conflict of interest

The authors declare they have no competing interests.

Author contributions

Conceptualization: All authors

Formal analysis: All authors

Investigation: Godfroy Rostant Pokam Djoko, Eric Martin Nomo

Methodology: Godfroy Rostant Pokam Djoko, Eric Martin Nomo

Writing - original draft: All authors

Writing - review & editing: All authors

Ethics approval and consent to participate

For this study, we obtained ethical clearance from the Institutional Ethics Committee for Human Health Research of the School of Health Sciences of the Catholic University of Central Africa [N°2024/020699/CEIRSH/ ESS/MSP]. In addition, an agreement was obtained from the Director of the District Hospital of Cité des Palmiers. Informed consent was obtained from adult participants and an assent from a guardian was obtained for justifying the voluntary participation of their minors in this research. Confidentiality and anonymity were maintained during data collection.

Consent for publication

Not applicable.

Availability of data

All data used and/or analyzed for this study are available from the corresponding author upon reasonable request.

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