I Won’t Give Up: HIV/AIDS Survival Stories

With over 940000 deaths globally and 1.8 million new cases in 2017, worldwide, HIV/AIDS is still a complicated condition the world is dealing with. India still accounts for 4^th highest number of deaths due to HIV/AIDS. As of now, there is no cure for this disease.

AIDS (Acquired Immunodeficiency Syndrome) is a condition caused by HIV (Human Immunodeficiency Virus). This virus attacks human immune system, making them weak and developing lower resistance against various disease. It makes the immune system so weak that even a simple cough and cold can become too troublesome for the infected person.

Though the world has seen a significant reduction in the number of new HIV patients as well as the number of deaths due to HIV/AIDS, yet, there is a long way to go. World AIDS Day is celebrated every year on 1^st December with an aim to spread awareness against the disease. This disease is still a taboo in many societies and people, despite the circulated information against the disease, have difficulty accepting HIV patients and these patients are treated as an outcast in the society.

Turacoz Healthcare Solutions brings to you few stories of people who are struggling hard with HIV/AIDS and leading their life. These are the stories of their struggle and the issues they have been facing ever since they were diagnosed with this condition.

“I have no one to shift the blame upon”

I am a 29-year-old female, living in Delhi. Everything was seemingly fine until I was diagnosed with HIV, 2 years back. My world shattered right in front of my eyes. How stupid was I to not to think that this disease can happened to me as I was so addicted to drugs and was involved in sharing needles to inject drugs. I always knew about this disease but thought it could never target me. I was wrong.

I went to rehab to get rid of my drug addiction. I was successful and was living a new life where there was no place for drugs and then this happened. I had fever that lasted for days and doctors recommended a blood test and the reports changed my life overnight. I was declared HIV positive.

It is hard to live as a HIV patient as your own guilt never leaves you, your body is not the same as before, you’re fighting with your health and at the same time the society has abandoned you.

This happened to me, I was declared an outcast. With few months of diagnosis, I lost many of my friends, relatives and almost every person in my social circle, excluding my parents. People used to label me as a character-less woman. But this disease is not just a sexually transmitted one, there are other factors too, and mine was one of them. But no one wanted to know how I felt. I struggled with everything from the loss of my health, friends to depression.

I was taking therapies and medicine for the disease and was also fighting depression at the same tie. My body wasn’t taking well, the anti-depressants, so they had to be stopped. My parents were my only support and every time I looked at them, I felt even more guilty. At one point I also thought of ending up my life but snapped back looking at my parents.

I just want to tell everyone that HIV/AIDS does equal harm to your mental health. If the society becomes more accepting of HIV patients, maybe we can reduce the stigma the patient faces. HIV doesn’t spread from touching or being with a HIV positive person. This is only transferrable through sexual transmission, sharing needles or blood transfusion.

Let’s make a society where HIV patients can live normally like other people. Let us be more accepting of HIV patients and understand and support them so that they can at least feel less pain mentally.

“I’m learning how to live with HIV”

Around 1.5 years back, my world changed when I was diagnosed with HIV. The blood reports stated “Reactive” and tears rolled down my face. I cursed the man who was responsible for this. He told me after a year of our sexually intimate relationship that he was HIV positive. I was devastated and out of fear went to get my blood test done and my fear came true.

I never felt ashamed of my sexual preferences and was okay being in a homosexual relationship with this man who gifted me the virus. I cursed him after seeing my blood reports and questioned him why he didn’t tell me before. ‘What is my fault?’ this was the question that kept echoing in my mind.

I was scared. For few days I didn’t tell this to anyone and then one day, I exploded in front of my friend and sobbed uncontrollably. She knew the state I was in. She comforted me and made me believe that everything will be alright. I slowly came to terms with my condition and now my family knew about this. It was devastating for them too, but with time they also learned to deal with the reality.

My initial struggle with the disease wasn’t an easy one. The news of me being HIV positive spread like a forest fire and in no time, I was secluded by the society I live in. A feeing of self-hatred and disgust developed into me and I stopped talking to anyone. My friend slowly took me out of the depression I was into, with the help of my family and other friends. She tried to make me feel good about myself.

There are various advancements been made in treatment of HIV/AIDS to help HIV patients live a long and healthy life. I went on to take antiretroviral therapy. Today, I have again started seeing myself in a different light. The feeling of self-hatred has been now diminishing and I am becoming more and more accepting.

My friends helped me a lot in coming to terms with my condition and they also helped others understand my situation. Around 2 years with this disease, I am now becoming more positive and learning to deal with the condition.

HIV is a lifelong condition and the person affected by it has to live on medications for his/her entire life. It can also happen to people who are involved in heterosexual relationships, so this is a myth that this is a disease brought in by the homosexuals.

Society needs to understand the pain a HIV positive person suffers and try to make them comfortable. Behave the way you are with others, with a HIV positive person. HIV patients are also part of this society.

There are many organizations that offer free antiretroviral therapy like AIDS Health Foundation, India HIV Alliance, etc. You can get the treatments from there. My message to all the HIV patients is that- “It can happen to anyone. Face the reality and learn to cope up with it. Through constant monitoring and taking the medications and therapies regularly, you can also live a healthy and long life. HIV is not the end of you.”

These 2 stories have few things in common:

• The struggle of HIV patients, health wise
• The social stigma they face

The most important thing for both these individuals was that, they decided to not to give up.

Our society needs to understand the fact that AIDS is not a general communicable disease and only spreads through vaginal or rectal fluids, semen, blood transfusion, breast milk & using shared needles. It does not spread through being friends with a HIV positive person. Accept HIV. Take precautionary measures and learn more about the disease, but secluding HIV patients from the society is not the way this condition is going to be solved.

Turacoz Healthcare Solutions, being a medical communication company, understands the sentiments and struggles of HIV patients and ask people to be more understanding of the disease and treat HIV patients as the part of their society and behave normally with them. Also, Turacoz appeals the HIV patients to be optimistic and never think of giving up. HIV certainly doesn’t mean the end of your life. You still have a long way to go. Take proper medications and antiretroviral therapy is going to help you live a long and healthy life.

Mentioned below are some helplines for HIV/AIDS patients in India:

• Helpline no.: 1097 (National AIDS Control Organization (NACO))
• Contact no.: +91 9892864024 (AIDS Society of India)
• Contact no.: 23543333, 23542222 (ASHA (Action Service Hope for AIDS))

Turacoz Healthcare Solutions offers medical writing services like regulatory writing, pharmacovigilance support, clinical trial support, publication writing, medico-marketing, etc.

To know more about our services and to get assistance from us, you can mail us at hello@turacoz.in

Medico Marketing Solutions At Your Convenience

Medico marketing, as the name suggests, is concerned with the marketing of the medical products. It is a process wherein the exchange of information takes place between as drug manufacturer and the consulting doctor/physician, pharmacist or patients.

The motive behind this information exchange is to explain the products of a company and how they are going to help patients/consumers in treatment of various health issues.

With the rapid advancements in technology, there has been a change in pharmaceutical marketing as well.  the drugs and devices are now marketed well so that their effects and usages are known well. It is basically generating sales.

How successful your medico marketing would be, depends on the strategies you use and the approaches and plans you have adopted for the marketing. A marketing management effort is bound to be successful when it follows the following process efficiently:

• Formulating goals
• Identifying the target market/audience
• Building-up a plan to achieve the goals
• Analyzing and monitoring the strategy at frequent intervals to track the progress

Marketing strategies used by pharma companies:

There are mainly 2 marketing strategies that pharmaceutical companies use. They are:

1. Push stream: The motive behind this strategy is to make an impact on the decision maker’s prescription behavior by using promotional items like journal articles, drug sampling, journal advertising, medical conferences, etc.
2. Pull stream: This strategy targets the end users/customers and forces the doctors to prescribe a certain drug/medicine based on the request of the patients.

Advertisements serve as an essential means to circulate the information on drugs and are widely used by drug manufacturers for promoting their products.

Now, the big question arises, whom to hire for the medico marketing? You need someone who is capable enough of designing and drafting various medico marketing documents efficiently and all those should be of good quality.

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The various medico marketing documents that Turacoz works on are:

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• Leave behind literature

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Here Is What You Need to Know About HIV/AIDS!

HIV/AIDS. This is a term which has been heard often. What is it?

Acquired Immune Deficiency Syndrome, better known as AIDS, is a lifelong condition that is caused by HIV (Human Immunodeficiency Virus). This virus exists in human blood, sexual fluids and breast milk. This virus attacks the human immune system, and this makes the body weak in resisting against viruses, common germs, fungi and other harmful elements.

The main cause of AIDS is unprotected sexual contact & using previously used syringes/needles.

The world celebrated World AIDS Day on 1^st December 2018 with an aim to raise awareness on this disease. According to WHO, ever since this disease has been discovered, it has been responsible for around 36 million deaths worldwide.

The population at a greater risk of being infected by HIV are bisexual & gay men and people who take drugs by injecting the shared needles. Socially underprivileged communities are also at a risk of forming this infection.

HIV is caused by a virus. For HIV to spread in your body, infected blood, semen or vaginal secretions must enter your body and this can happen by following ways:

By having unprotected sex: Any vaginal, oral or anal sex done without the use of contraceptive like condom can get you infected with HIV. This virus can enter your body via small tears or mouth sores that usually develop in rectum or vagina during sexual intercourse. People having sex with multiple partners, without any protection can also be infected by it.

By blood transfer: By transfusing infected blood, one can get this virus. Though many blood banks now check the blood before transfusing.

By sharing needles: People taking drugs through needles/syringes can get this infection if they share the needles with each other. Contaminated needles put you at the risk of other infectious diseases as well.

During pregnancy, delivery or breast-feeding: Mothers, infected with HIV can transfer it to their children. If proper treatment taken at proper time, the child can be protected against it.

HIV does not spread by:

Hugging, kissing, touching or shaking hands with a HIV positive person, nor does it spread through air, water or insect bites.

Symptoms of HIV:

There are different stages of HIV and the symptoms vary accordingly.

Primary infection stage (Acute HIV): Mostly people affected by HIV get flu-like disease in a month or two of getting infected by the virus. This may last for a few weeks. The symptoms are:

• Fever
• Headache
• Pain in muscles and joints
• Sore throat & mouth sores
• Rashes
• Swelling in lymph glands, especially on neck

These symptoms might go unnoticed as they are very mild, however the amount of virus in your body is high during this time and the infection spreads easily.

Clinical latent infection (Chromic HIV): Regular swelling in lymph nodes occur during this stage for most people. There are no other evident symptoms and the virus continues to affect the white blood cells adversely. This stage of HIV continues for around 10 years in case one is not seeking antiretroviral therapy. The disease can worsen even after taking this therapy in some people or this stage might still last for many years.

Symptomatic HIV: With the prevalence of the virus in your body, your immune cells start to doze off and your immunity levels falls drastically making you prone to mild infections and chronic symptoms like:

• Fever
• Tiredness
• Diarrhea
• Weight loss
• Swelling in lymph nodes
• Thrush (oral yeast infection)
• Herpes zoster

Transformation to AIDS: AIDS is that stage of HIV when your immune system is highly damaged. The average tenure of HIV turning into AIDS is 10 years. At this stage, a person is at a high risk of infections and opportunistic cancers. There will be diseases which usually do not bother a person with sound immune system. The symptoms of such infections are:

• Night sweating
• Frequent fever
• Recurring diarrhea
• Persistent white spots on the tongue or mouth
• Skin rashes or bumps

As of now, there is no drug or vaccine invented that can cure HIV, though the research is going on for the same. The best way is to stay alert and take precautionary steps like having protected sex, using sterilized needles and avoid having unprotected sex with multiple partners.

Turacoz Healthcare Solutions convey that if you think that you might have been infected by the virus or are at the risk of being infected by it, contact your healthcare provider as early as possible to avoid further complications.

Turacoz Healthcare Solutions is a medical communication company offering various medical writing services, pharmacovigilance support, medico-marketing and publication services. It has a highly skilled and dedicated team of expert medical writers who work on a variety of medical documents including clinical trial documents.

Turacoz has a dedicated team of clinical research experts who are proactive at handling various clinical trial documents like informed consent forms, protocols, investigator brochures and clinical study reports for each phase of clinical trial in any therapeutic area.

Get your work done by experts at Turacoz and rest assured for the quality and timeliness of the documents. Turacoz believes in delivering quality output to the clients and supports prompt delivery of work.

To know more about us and our services you can get in touch with us at:

hello@turacoz.in

We will be pleased to help you.

Quick and Easy Fix for Your Clinical Trial Requirements!

Exploring new dimensions and working towards new advancements defines the science today. Numerous experiments, innovations, inventions and researches are the faces of science in the modern era. With such fast-paced development in treatment of various ailments, backed by the advanced technology, many drugs have surfaced which are expected to treat certain diseases.

Clinical trials are the result of all these researches and quest for innovation and advancement in medical science.

What are Clinical Trials?

Clinical trials are scientific investigations carried out to discover better approaches to avert, screen for, analyze, or treat illness. These trials may likewise indicate which medical methodologies work best for specific sicknesses or group of individuals. Clinical trials create excellent data for healthcare decision-making.

The motive behind clinical trials is to answer scientific queries. In this manner, these trials pursue strict, logical guidelines which secure patients and help deliver dependable clinical trial outcomes. Clinical trials are one of the last phases of a long and watchful research & development process. The procedure usually starts in a lab, where researchers initially generate and test new ideas.

Phases of clinical trial:

Clinical trial is divided into 4 phases. These are explained as under:

• Phase 1: Testing of an experimental drug, device or vaccines on a small group of individuals to get a hang of the safety, possibility of side effects and evaluating how the drug should be given.
• Phase 2: A larger group of people is set off to experimenting the safety and efficacy of the treatment and this procedure can last for many years.
• Phase 3: This is an extensive study involving many participants. This is the comparison phase where the new/experimental drug or vaccine is compared to a placebo or existing/standard treatments. Some side effects that might go unnoticed during Phase 2 trials, can be discovered during this phase. The regulatory authorities will consider the trials up to this phase and will decide upon the approval of the new drug.
• Phase 4: This phase is the last one and comes into the picture post approval of the drug by the regulatory authorities. The drug’s safety and efficacy are observed on diverse populations.
  

With every clinical trial, a protocol is associated, which informs that what is to be done in the trials, how many phases are to be conducted and which one would be the most important one. These protocols also include guideline or eligibility criteria describing who can attend a clinical trial.

There are a lot of documents involved in the whole process of clinical trials. The entire cycle of drug development includes planning a clinical trial, preparing various documents both pre-& post trials in accordance with country-specific guidelines, submission documents and safety reporting.

The issue faced here is to get such a team of skilled and expert professionals who can handle the documents carefully and work on them with the required expertise and knowledge. This is very crucial for any Clinical Trial Organization (CRO) or pharmaceutical organization.

Here is a quick fix to all your troubles related to clinical trial documents: Turacoz Healthcare Solutions.

Turacoz Healthcare Solutions is a medical communication company offering various medical writing services, pharmacovigilance support, medico-marketing and publication services. It has a highly skilled and dedicated team of expert medical writers who work on a variety of medical documents including clinical trial documents.

Turacoz has a dedicated team of clinical research experts who are proactive at handling various clinical trial documents like informed consent forms, protocols, investigator brochures and clinical study reports for each phase of clinical trial in any therapeutic area.

Get your work done by experts at Turacoz and rest assured for the quality and timeliness of the documents. Turacoz believes in delivering quality output to the clients and supports prompt delivery of work.

To know more about us and our services you can get in touch with us at:
hello@turacoz.in
We will be pleased to help you.