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Counseling network started for AIDS-infected mothersRALEIGH (AP) — Health workers are building a new statewide network of counselors who can help women with AIDS plan the future of their children before they are gone.The counselors will teach HIV-infected mothers about drawing up wills that spell out who will take care of their kids when they cannot. They also will help family members deal with their grief, train them in how to care for people infected with HIV and tutor them in child development.A half-million-dollar grant from Duke Endowment is financing the network of counselors, which justgot underway.The teachers eventually will bebased at Duke University Medical Center in Durham, UNC Hospitals in Chapel Hill, Carolinas Medical Center in Charlotte, Pitt County Memorial Hospital and N.C. Baptist Hospitals in Winston-Salem, The News Observer of Raleighreported today.Often, women diagnosed withthe fatal disease are unmarried and their children’s only active parent. “People let the situation fallapart and then try to clean up themess, said Chris Weedy, a social worker at Duke Hospital’s pediatric infectious diseases clinic.It’s not difficult to understand why women gel sick without making plans for their children, saidDr. Catherine Wilfert, a Duke pediatrician and AIDS researcher.“It’s a denial process, not in any sense malicious. It’s difficult to say, ‘I have a fatal illness and I am not going to be here forever,’ Wilfert said. “It’s ideal that this happens when people are feeling relatively well, not so rotten they can’t think about these things.” Amy Zimmerman, is a Duke counselor and recently became the first of what’s called a permanencyplanner for the new network. Zimmerman has made contact with 17 mothers so far.Between 1990 and 1993, at least 723 women who gave birth in this state were HIV positive.
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Aberdeen Moore County Citizen News Record
Aberdeen, North Carolina, US
Tue, Aug 02, 1994
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