Abstract
M.A. (Psychology)
The Acquired Immunodeficiency Syndrome not only threatens the world with hitherto
unknown rates of mortality and economic ruin, but has also saddled the health sciences
with an unprecedented challenge in curing and managing this disease. Herein, the health sciences have not found a cure, and the management of the disease is made extremely difficult because of the unpredictable nature of the interrelationships in biopsychosocial
factors inherent in the disease.
In order to attempt a description of the complex interrelationships between
biopsychosocial factors in this disease, a group of twenty patients in a treatment programme
comprising of an exercise and cognitive-behavioural intervention, were
subjected to immunologic and psychological assessment before and subsequent to the
intervention.
The data obtained indicated that none of the interrelationships between psychological and immunological variables predicted by psychoneuroimmunological science existed prior to
the intervention. It would appear that the interrelationships between these variables were
in total disarray - defeating the object of systematic logical description of biopsychosocial
factors in this condition.
The post- intervention data suggested a pattern of interrelationships totally within the
confines of predicted neuropsychoimmunologic patterns of a biopsychosocial interaction
in a disease of immunologic origin.
This pattern of predictability would then render possible a treatment programme of a
multidisciplinary nature which would bear predictable fruit. It also underscores the
necessity of psychological interventions as an adjunct in the treatment of AIDS.