Physician Use of the HIV Antibody Test

Abstract

IN 1985,I was the primary physician for a young man whose life was ruined by the inappropriate disclosure of a positive human immunodeficiency virus (HIV)—antibody test. A physician ordered the test without consent and notified the local health department of the positive result. The health department notified the individual's employer and he was promptly fired. These events became common knowledge at his workplace and in his rural Midwestern town and he was shunned. His landlord asked him to move. Ten days after testing, the life he had known for the past ten years was permanently ruined and he left town. With the loss of his job came loss of health insurance and insurability; he has been unable to obtain health or life insurance since then. See also p 229. In this case, no purpose was served by obtaining the HIV-antibody test. The patient had been diagnosed with acquired immunodeficiency syndrome