Journal of the International AIDS Society Blog

Launch of "Family-centred services for children affected by HIV and AIDS" Supplement

The HIV epidemic continues to place a great burden on children, and the importance that treatment and care for children are integrated into the broader context of family-support schemes is becoming increasingly recognised. However, despite growing evidence of the benefits of family-centred services, reforms in favour of family-oriented HIV interventions have been slow to emerge.

With this month’s supplement on “Family-centred services for children affected by HIV and AIDS” the Journal of the International AIDS Society (JIAS) brings together in one place for the first time the rationale for family-centred services for children affected by HIV and AIDS and some of the available evidence for the effectiveness of doing so.

The issue comprises nine articles by leading researchers in the field, starting with an introduction by Linda Richter and followed by contributions from Theresa Betancourt and colleagues on family-centred models for prevention of vertical transmission and Sarah Leeper and colleagues, who analyse the impact of family-services on children’s health. In addition Lorraine Sherr as well as Vicky Hosegood and Sangeetha Madhavan explore the role of men in these types of programmes. Two articles by Jennifer Beard and colleagues, and Sunil Solomon and colleagues describe family-centred care for marginalized groups. Focusing on pre- and early adolescents, Arvin Bhana and colleagues review an intervention project and the concluding article of the issue by Mark Tomlinson examines links to the field of depression.

We hope this special issue constitutes a beginning of what could be a groundswell of interest in family-centred services for children affected by HIV and AIDS. We would like to invite and encourage readers to contemplate the diverse aspects of this area and to engage with the editors and the authors in dialogue on this important and timely issue by using the ‘comment’ option on the JIAS website below each article.

 

 

 

Posted by Rose-Marie Neuenschwander at 12:57    Comments (0)