Foreword: Why we wrote this report
Over 25 years ago, two women living with HIV, put up hand drawn posters in HIV clinics and
gathered a group together in their living room to offer each other support. Such were the
humble origins of Positively UK and our model of peer support.
Today Positively UK provides peer led support to over 1 , 000 people each year through
information, mentoring, guidance, advocacy, groups and workshops. Our aim is to improve
the physical, emotional and social well-being of people living with HIV; good health and quality
of life is determined by all three, they are equally important and often over-lapping.
We can only achieve this if we work collaboratively. That means collaboratively with all those
accessing peer support in sharing their insight and strategies for managing HIV, other health
and social care services providing a wider range of specialist services, and HIV clinics to
ensure people living with HIV access the best clinical care possible.
HIV is now considered a long-term medical condition and treatments now mean people living
with HIV can have a comparable life-expectancy with people who are not HIV positive.
However HIV brings particular challenges in managing those medications and their side
effects, managing sexual health when living with a communicable condition, and managing
the psychological impact of living with a condition that is still met with stigma.
This research was designed so we could understand more the role of Positively UK’s peer-led
services in enabling people to better manage and improve health and well-being:
•
What is the perception of Positively UK’s peer support?
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How does our peer support enable people to better manage their health?
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How does this support complement clinical care?
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How does this support impact on well-being?
We believe access to good quality peer support is vital for people living with HIV. This report
sets out to demonstrate that, and how our work contributes to both the NHS Outcomes
Framework in managing long-term conditions, and Public Health Outcomes Framework in
improving well-being. We hope this report will be of benefit to all Positively UK’s donors in
demonstrating the value of their investment, and as a useful resource to anyone seeking to
establish local peer-led services. Nobody should face HIV alone, and we hope this research
encourages everyone to understand the value of peer support now and in the future.
Allan Anderson
Chief Executive
Posi tively UK
