Perceptions of Access to HIV-Related Information, Care, and Services among Infected Minority Men

Abstract

The findings from a qualitative investigation of HIV-infected African American and Puerto Rican gay and bisexual men's experiences obtaining HIV-related information; seeking HIV-related health care; as well as soliciting assistance from, and involvement with, HIV/AIDS service organizations are presented. Many men felt that their race or ethnicity-alone or together with their lower socioeconomic status-had been a factor in their experiences in seeking illness-related information, health care, advocacy, and social services. With respect to medical care, African American men held more critical and distrustful attitudes toward physicians than did Puerto Rican men. Both groups of men viewed the principal, high-profile, HIV-related advocacy and social service organizations as largely disinterested in non-White and non-middle-class clients. The men also viewed the minority-focused HIV/AIDS organizations as largely ineffectual.