Strategies for disclosing HIV status to sexual partners and their relationship to healthcare provision

Disclosure of HIV status to sexual partners poses a challenge during healthcare provision, highlighting both the responsibility for controlling the epidemic and ensuring the patient's psychosocial well-being. This study's objective was to grasp the strategies used by health professionals for such disclosure. This is a qualitative study based on the discourse of health professionals and patients at specialized STD/AIDS clinics in the city of Sao Paulo, Brazil, using individual interviews and focus and educational groups. The strategies range from threatening to complicity, and the main focus is to minimize the stigma attached to individuals with HIV. It is believed that an active problem-solving approach to stigma in real situations in the clinic can provide a possible and practical path for dealing with such stigma, by creating argumentative repertoires, allowing the emergence of normative horizons that are technically, ethically, and politically relevant for integrating disclosure of the HIV diagnosis to the sexual partner and healthcare for persons with HIV.