essential when they started therapy, but by six months - perhaps because they were feeling better - they were wondering if they really had to keep on taking them.
Professor Horne commented: "We must elicit concerns about therapy before prescribing it; we must continue to monitor patients' concerns and perception of the necessity of their regime; and we must try to minimise the impact of these regimes on daily living."

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Irish stamp out mum-to-baby transmission

A concerted screening and treatment programme in Ireland has reduced the frequency of HIV transmission from mums to their babies to 1.4 per cent - only three cases in 205 positive pregnancies between 1997 and 2001.
In the UK, by contrast, 91 babies became HIV positive in 2000 alone. Only 18 transmission cases have been reported so far from 2001, however, and the highest-prevalence area - inner London - is on track to fulfil a target of testing 80 per cent of pregnant women by the end of this year, though lower-prevalence areas lag behind.
HIV testing of pregnant women in Ireland has become almost universal, Dr Fiona Lyons told the 8th BHIVA Conference, despite a large increase in positive asylum seekers coming to the country, especially in the last year.
Only a third of women were diagnosed before pregnancy, she told the conference, but of the two-thirds diagnosed during pregnancy, more than half had tests before the 28th week (the average pregnancy is 40 weeks).

Women diagnosed before 36 weeks who had never taken antiretroviral drugs were usually given AZT/3TC (Combivir), unless they had high viral