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As the health-care provider of Sonja (I am her nurse-practitioner, not her doctor), I want to comment on protease inhibitors and add a few points [“Bitter Pills,” April 25]. First, I thought Justin Hayford drew a sensitive, personal portrait that rang true with the Sonja that I know. Her struggles demonstrate that health-care providers cannot simply tear off scribbled medication orders from the prescription pad and bark out instructions. Discovering the patient’s point of view, obstacles, and strengths takes up a lot of my patient-care activity time. Yet, as sensitive as I try to be, there were aspects of Sonja’s difficulties in taking her medications that I only learned about in the Reader. It was humbling.
This level of relative health would not have been possible in 1994-1995 prior to the advances in HIV treatment, including protease inhibitors. In six years at least 49 of my patients have died. With so many deaths, I tried hard to adjust to the role of “palliative” caregiver, but I never managed to feel comfortable, always wishing for better tools to treat and cure. It is painful to remember each patient who died too soon to benefit from the new treatments. I feel grateful that there are more options available to treat Sonja’s HIV disease. I wish we could cure Sonja.
