In a recent study released by the Kaiser Family Foundation, results show that eight million people learned correct information about the mother to child HIV transmission rates.

Working with Grey's Anatomy, the Foundation embedded a health message within an episode and surveyed viewer both before (one week) and after (one week) the episode airing. The story revolved around an HIV positive pregnant woman who learns that with treatment she will have a 98% chance of delivering a healthy baby. Increased awareness rose from 15% to 61% among viewers. Later investigation (six weeks afterward) found retention rates to be 47%--still higher than before television viewing.

"For better or worse, viewers do absorb the health information they see on TV, so it's important for these shows to get it right. This study shows the enormous potential for entertainment television to serve as a health educator." said Victoria Rideout, Vice President and Director of The Program for the Study of Media and Health at the Kaiser Family Foundation, and author of the Grey's study.

Further Findings:

--The percentage of viewers who said it was "irresponsible for a woman who knows she is HIV positive to have a baby" dropped from 61% to 34% after the episode aired. Six weeks after broadcast, the figure had gone back up to 47%, still 14 percentage points below the pre-show level.

-- About three in ten (29%) regular Grey's viewers say they think the medical information on the show is 'very' accurate, while another 58% say it's 'somewhat' accurate.

-- Just under half (45%) of all regular viewers say they have learned something new about a health issue from the show.

-- After the target episode aired, the health information about mother-to-child HIV transmission rates was referenced by at least 35 blogs. 

In Prime Time television programming, the most common health topic found in top-rated TV shows was an unusual illness or disease, focusing more on symptoms (65%), treatment (59%), and diagnosis (50%) over prevention (10%).

The CDC states that, "HIV transmission from mother to child during pregnancy, labor and delivery, or breastfeeding is called perinatal transmission.  Without treatment, the risk of mother-to-child transmission of HIV, the virus that causes AIDS, is 25%. In the past, there was no effective treatment available and hundreds of HIV-positive babies were born in the U.S. each year.  About 100-200 babies are infected in the United States annually--perinatal HIV transmission is the most common route of HIV infection in children and is the source of almost all children's AIDS cases in America.  Today, the risk is less than 2% if the proper medication and care are received - one of the true success stories of the fight against HIV/AIDS.

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