Medical nonadherence in pediatric HIV: psychosocial risks and intersection with the child protection system for medical neglect.

Nonadherence to antiretroviral treatment has serious health implications for HIV-infected children, at times warranting referral to child protective services (CPS). The current study of 134 children with perinatally acquired HIV infection aimed to investigate rates of treatment adherence and CPS involvement, multilevel variables associated with nonadherence, and the manner in which these risks operated together in the prediction of adherence outcomes. Risk factors for nonadherence were grouped on the basis of confirmatory factor models, and factor score regression was carried out to determine which factors were uniquely predictive of adherence.

Pediatric epidemic crisis: Lessons for policy and practice development.

Objectives: This research study addresses health policy and patient care considerations, and outlines policy and practice implications resulting from a crisis in a pediatric setting. This crisis, an epidemic outbreak of Severe Acute Respiratory Syndrome (SARS), dramatically impacted the delivery of health care in Canada. Despite the passage of time since the last diagnosed case of SARS in April 2004, researchers have warned the global community to be prepared for future outbreaks of SARS or other infectious diseases.