Counseling Therapy With Hatha Yoga on Adherence Level, Nutritional Status, and Quality of Life Among HIV-Infected Adolescents

HIV infection and AIDS are associated with numerous challenges, and infected people experience extreme despair, fear, anxiety, and depression. However, counseling therapy and yoga techniques may help ease stress-related illness, produce internal strength through relaxation, and enhance immunity.

This study aimed to evaluate the effectiveness of counseling therapy and Hatha yoga on the adherence level, nutritional status, and quality of life (QOL) of HIV-infected adolescents.

A randomized controlled trial study was conducted. Through the simple random method, 388 (195 in the experimental and 193 in the control group) HIV-infected adolescents were selected. The data of HIV-infected adolescents and caregivers were collected from four main Antiretroviral Therapy clinics in Chennai, India, through Standardized Antiretroviral Therapy adherence, QOL, and a structured nutritional assessment questionnaire. Motivational counseling was given to the experimental group, and the researcher demonstrated selected asanas. The data were collected from both groups at 0, 3, and 6 months intervals. The descriptive statistics of mean, standard deviation, and inferential statistics of the student independent t test and Chi-square test were used to determine the effectiveness of interventional variables in both groups.

The Mean±SD age of the experimental group of adolescents was 13.6±2.2 years, and that of the control group was 13.8±2.4 years. There is an improvement range in the experimental vs the control group for the components of adherence level (13.4% vs 4.9%) and QOL (15.1% vs 0.9%) at a significance of P=0.001 with a 95% confidence interval. Also, the nutritional gain score was significantly increased to 9.3% vs 1.5% (P=0.05). Regarding CD4 (cluster of differentiation 4) count, the baseline mean score was 664.86 vs 669.72, whereas, in the sixth month, it significantly increased to 840.35 vs 703.35 (P=0.001).

Motivational counseling and behavior modification of yoga efficiently improved health status and well-being among HIV-infected adolescents in the experimental group compared to the control group.