Brief Telephonic Motivational Interviewing for People Living with HIV with Follow-up Problems

Area of Science:

• Public Health
• Behavioral Science
• Infectious Disease Management

Background:

• People living with HIV (PLWHIV) often experience challenges with consistent medical follow-up.
• Motivational interviewing (MI) shows promise in addressing adherence issues in chronic disease management.

Purpose of the Study:

• To assess the motivation stages of PLWHIV with medical follow-up problems.
• To evaluate the effectiveness of a single telephone-based MI intervention in engaging PLWHIV in care.

Main Methods:

• Assessed motivation stages before and after a single MI intervention session.
• Monitored medical appointment attendance for six months post-intervention.
• Included 39 PLWHIV with medical follow-up challenges.

Main Results:

• Over half of participants (51.3%) were initially in precontemplation/contemplation stages.
• 71.0% of participants (n=22) advanced motivation stages post-intervention (z = -4.235, p < .001).
• Most participants successfully attended subsequent medical appointments.

Conclusions:

• Brief, remote MI interventions are effective for engaging PLWHIV in care, particularly those in early stages of change.
• MI can help address barriers to attending medical appointments for PLWHIV.
• This approach is suitable for low-resource settings to improve HIV care continuity.