| Affiliation: | (1) Department of Community Medicine, University of Zambia, School of Medicine, Box 50110, Lusaka, Zambia;(2) Faculty of Medicine and Dentistry, University of Bergen, Centre for International Health, 5020 Bergen, Norway |
| Abstract: | Background Mental distress is common in primary care and overrepresented among Human Immunodeficiency virus (HIV)-infected individuals, but access to effective treatment is limited, particularly in developing countries. Explanatory models (EM) are contextualised explanations of illnesses and treatments framed within a given society and are important in understanding an individual's perspective on the illness. Although individual variations are important in determining help-seeking and treatment behaviour patterns, the ability to cope with an illness and quality of life, the role of explanatory models in shaping treatment preferences is undervalued. The aim was to identify explanatory models employed by HIV-infected and uninfected individuals and to compare them with those employed by local health care providers. Furthermore, we aimed to build a theoretical model linking the perception of mental distress to treatment preferences and coping mechanisms. |
