Research at Keele Discovering Excellence | Page 26

Discovering Excellence | Living with HIV in later life

Living with HIV
in later life
Dr Dana Rosenfeld
New study will inform future interventions designed to improve the social
support, mental health and quality of life of older people living with HIV
Thanks to effective medication introduced in the late 1990s, HIV, or the Human
Immunodeficiency Virus, has changed from an acute, fatal condition to a chronic,
manageable one, with many people with HIV now surviving into later years
A new Keele study is exploring the
lives of older people living with HIV.
This wide-ranging study entitled
HIV and Later Life, or HALL,
aims to inform new interventions
designed to improve the social
support, mental health and quality
of life of this growing yet often
unrecognised group.
Dr Dana Rosenfeld, from Keele
University’s Centre for Social
Gerontology, whose earlier research
has explored lesbian and gay
ageing and the long-term effects
of the AIDS epidemic on gay male
communities, is leading this new
study. Drawing on Dr Rosenfeld’s
background in medical sociology,
social gerontology, and gender
and sexuality, and with the help
of an interdisciplinary research
team representing the social
sciences, medicine, psychology,
psychiatry, epidemiology, and the
HIV community, this innovative
collaboration will explore the life
histories, mental health, social
support and quality of life of older
people with HIV, along with their
experience and management
of personal, medical and social
dimensions of HIV.

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Dr Rosenfeld explains, “Previous
research shows that older people
living with HIV are more likely
to experience depression, illness
and mortality than HIV-negative
people. What’s more, unlike the
HIV-negative older population,
depression rates of those living with
HIV in later life do not decrease
with age, which could be down to
their smaller and more fragile social
support networks. Yet despite
growing academic and medical
interest in ageing with HIV, little
is known about how these older
people’s different histories and
circumstances shape how they
experience and manage the social
and medical implications of HIV
in later life, and how their social
resources and actions relate to
mental health and quality of life.”
To capture these connections, the
team is conducting interviews with
representatives from key groups
including clinicians, policy makers
and HIV activists and service
providers, and 6 focus groups and
90 life-history interviews with older
gay men, and with older Black
African and white heterosexual
men and women, living with
HIV, all recruited through clinics
and community organisations in
London. The team will also gather
mental health survey data, and

compare them with interview data
to see how these older persons’
social support systems relate to
their mental health. Results will be
disseminated through academic
and scientific venues, uploaded
onto the project’s website
(www.keele.ac.uk/hall), and
presented to the HIV community
at an end-of-project conference in
July 2013.
The project, ending in October
2013, is funded with £211,316 over
two years by the Lifelong Health
and Wellbeing Cross-Council
Programme led by the Medical
Research Council and the Economic
and Social Research Council.
The Lifelong Health and Wellbeing (LLHW)
initiative is a funding collaboration between
the UK’s research councils and health
departments. LLHW funds multidisciplinary
research to find out more about what
influences health and ageing throughout life.
The Medical Research Council manages the
LLHW initiative on behalf of the funders.

For more information see
www.mrc.ac.uk/LLHW