Predictors of death and survival duration among a sample of persons living with HIV/AIDS

A follow-up study was conducted on a sample of 120 ethnically diverse HIV-positive men and women first interviewed in 2000. Participant survival and death rates were ascertained from death records and analyses were performed to identify demographic and psychosocial predictors of survival from the original data. Consistent with past studies, factors associated with survival were age, CD4 count, years HIV positive, and lower alcohol use. Two analyses identified use of professional counseling as a unique factor associated with reduced risk of death. Contrary to our hypotheses, the results from these analyses did not suggest that social groups with fewer economic and institutional resources or those with limited access to highly active retroviral therapy (HAART) therapies were at reduced risk of survival.