In the area of complementary therapies (CT) for HIV and AIDS, several remedies against retrovirus or opportunistic diseases (like candidosis or herpes etc) are used and/or tested: specially last ones represent an everyday problem also for many active drug users as well as for many subjects to whom RDRH strategies are addressed.
We work above all with people who have past or still present drug experience : for this we can observe the interaction, interconnection and synergies among drug-addiction - seropositivity - AIDS - therapeutic programs - CT for HIV and AIDS. We can state that, in our experience, a better self care, also due to CT use, represents one of the factors that positively affect therapeutic programs and individual autonomy.
AIDS emergency has exerted an important influence on intervention strategiesand therapeutic programs, as it has sapped the very motivation, active on the imaginary and on the realization of a future project of life and, consequently; even the conception of the self determination incidence on one's own future is deeply compromised. The possibility to use CT to treat opportunistic diseases and support immune system can transform this unfavourable factor and become a resource for the subject (towards the disease) and for health and social workers ( as an opportunity of communication and relation).
We made these remarks in a community context but they are likely to have still more importance if CT could be experimented in a low threshold service or in the context of RDRH.
If we consider RDRH as a dinamic factor not standing on addiction or complementary to therapeutic intervention and we see it integrated in the possible "becoming" of the subject; if we consider paths of empowerment as an integral part of RDRH strategies but also propedeutic to an always growing desire of pursuing freedom from drug; with just title we can put CT for HIV among the possible instruments for RDRH as :
* they have an olistic and comprehensive view of the subject and of the disease aiming to alert endogenous resources of individual
* they excite the attention and the responsibleness of the subject together with self care (hygiene, nutrition, regular consumption of remedies) liable to continuous development
* they practically never present toxicological problems and can be prepared in "cheap" formulations, within active drug users' reach
*they represent an improvement of life standard and correspond to a primary need of the subject.
Besides :
*CT basic elements can be easily learnt by "street workers"
* represent a possible way of contact and an effective relational continuity as they stimulate an immediately available relation and under this form of " bridge for communication" they can also be a vehicle of information for prevention and profilaxis messages
The stimulus to research in this field, the introduction of a specific formation for social workers, the study of feasability represent an important resource for RDRH intervention and a sperimentation field that must be activated.