Avoidance as a predictor of the biological course of HIV infection over a 7-year period in gay men

The present study prospectively investigated the relation between avoidance coping and active cognitive and behavioral coping and the progression of H IV infection over 7 years in 181 gay men. Findings revealed that for a numb er of medical and behavioral factors, (a) avoidance coping predicted a lowe r rate of decline in CD4 cells, (b) the proportional hazard (PH) attributab le to avoidance of developing a syncytium-inducing HIV variant was 0.72 (95 % confidence interval [CI]: 0.53 - 0.99, p < .05), and (c) the PH attributa ble to avoidance of dropping below 200 CD4 cells/mu l was 0.66 (95% CI: 0.5 0 - 0.89, p < .01). Avoidance coping was not related to the development of AIDS-defining clinical symptoms. Active cognitive and behavioral coping was not related to the outcome measures.