Access for all – an analysis of children-related abstracts at the International AIDS Conference, Bangkok

Abstract

HIV issues in children are often less well highlighted than in adults. International conferences form a focal point for dissemination and research and this study provides an analysis of children related abstracts from the Bangkok AIDS conference (2004). A total of 8057 abstracts were printed onto a conference-specific CD, which forms the basis of this analysis. Submitting authors had a 6.08% chance of an oral abstract, a 62.9% chance of a poster presentation and a 31% chance of their abstract being rejected. A keyword search compared the topic of children with 18 other HIV-related topics. An in-depth analysis and coding of the child-related abstracts (n = 337 abstracts) examined patterns of acceptance, methodologies used (empirical or not) nature of data (qualitative vs. quantitative), subject matter, nature of population studied and age of children. Of 490 oral and 5068 poster abstracts accepted in Bangkok, 19 (3.9%) and 116 (2.3%) were child-related. Child-related abstracts formed 3.6% of accepted abstracts, appearing in all tracks as both oral and poster presentations, but less likely to feature than the average acceptance rate. A broad keyword search shows that medical topics [highly active anti-retroviral therapy (HAART), side effects, treatment] are more likely to be accepted than are child-related topics. Rejection rates for child-related abstracts were higher than for medical topics. Oral abstract acceptance was significantly more likely in the medical tracks (A, B and C) than the more social science tracks (D and E). There were more psychosocial than medical abstracts, yet medical abstracts were nearly four times as likely to be accepted for oral presentation (χ² = 12.96, p > 0.005). Poster acceptance was roughly equal. Studies that utilized quantitative methodology had higher acceptance (χ² = 9.6, p = 0.008). Medical abstracts were more likely to be empirical and quantitative. There was a threefold higher acceptance rate for empirical abstracts. More than 90% of qualitative abstracts were psychosocial. Psychosocial abstracts cross into the clinical fields, but with no reciprocity. Work on HIV-positive children was more likely to be accepted than on affected children. Work concentrating on younger children was less frequent and less likely to be accepted and more likely to appear in the medically related tracks. There is an under-representation of child-related abstracts at the Bangkok conference. A picture of prioritization of medical, empirical quantitative data emerged. This should inform research and abstract submission for the future.

Keywords:

• Children
• research
• conference
• abstracts
• HIV
• AIDS

Acknowledgements

This work was carried out under the Bernard van Leer Foundation initiative on Children and HIV/AIDS – the Road to Toronto. The author acknowledges assistance from Peter Laugharn, John Miller, IAS for database access, Yonatan Sherr for IT, Jessica Cohen and Hannah Fenton for coding.