Newly-single Women and HIV

Ladies: Before you rush out of your family lawyer's, Pasadena, office and head for the singles bar in search of a "hook up", you may want to read this...

According to a study from the University of Florida conducted by Kathryn Grant, many divorced, middle-aged women are at high risk for contracting sexually-transmitted diseases. Most tellingly, the study revealed a lack of communication between doctors and older women on the topic of HIV. Almost two-thirds of middle-aged women who had started dating after divorce or widowhood said they feared they were at risk for contracting HIV and other sexually-transmitted diseases. Yet the women polled said their physicians rarely spoke to them about the dangers of sexually-transmitted diseases. The doctors interviewed for the study, on the other hand, said that professional, older women usually are not considered to be at risk for HIV and AIDS. Women in their late teens and early twenties are statistically more susceptible to STDs, and therefore receive more information than women who are older.

Most of the 44 women interviewed by Grant said they didn't feel comfortable talking to their doctors about sex and sexually-transmitted diseases. About half of the women, who range in age from 44 to 68, said they believed it was the patient's responsibility to voice concerns about STDs, while 28 percent said that the doctor should routinely ask all patients regardless of age about sexual activity and STDs. The remainder of the women polled said they believed it was up to both parties to initiate the conversation. Seventy-four percent of the doctors interviewed agreed that both doctors and patients should initiate a discussion about HIV.

The biggest revelation out of the studies is that both doctors and older female patients said they didn't feel comfortable talking about HIV with one another in fear of embarrassment or that they would offend the other person. AIDS health care professionals say that this lack of communication is still the biggest issue regarding HIV education while stressing safe sex and that routine testing is important at any age. According to aidswisdom.org, in the last decade, AIDS cases in women over 50 tripled. Grant was inspired to conduct the study after reading a magazine article about a divorced woman in her mid-50s who contracted HIV after she re-entered the dating scene.