¹Gender, Culture and Health Research Unit: PsyHealth, School of Psychology, University of Western Sydney, Locked Bag 1797, Penrith South DC, New South Wales 1797, Australia. E-mail: w.wong@uws.edu.au

Abstract

This paper explores the lived experiences of people with Human Immunodeficiency Virus (HIV) and Acquired Immune Deficiency Syndrome (AIDS) in the era of effective treatments. Informed by post-structuralist epistemology, the aim of this paper is to interrogate the concept of quality of life within the context of living with HIV as a treatable, manageable and chronic disease, by critiquing the utility of the concept as a gauge by which the success of treatment intervention is assessed. In doing so, it draws on a theoretical analysis of the quality of life concept, and examines the complexities and difficulties embedded in treatment use, which in turn facilitates an exploration of the disparity between the ways that the healthy body is positioned within medical discourse and the subjectively constituted notion of well-being. A case study of a person with HIV will be presented to underscore the importance of quality of life as subjectively constituted rather than as a clinical outcome.