Table 2.

Interview excerpts illustrating positive influences on adherence Category name Elaboration Illustrative interview excerpts

Category name	Elaboration	Illustrative interview excerpts
1. Behavioral strategies to support adherence	Reminders of dosing time, e.g. alarms, TV/radio programs, Wisepill device	“I have an alarm in my phone. So it goes off and I’d know the time [to take my pills].” Woman, S. Africa, Age 22 “[The Wisepill device] helps me because it is not easy for people to know what is inside, or that I keep my tablets inside. …It also works as reminder that I should get that thing from the cupboard and drink my pills.” Woman, S. Africa, Age 20
	Ensuring transport would be available on clinic appointment days	“When I know I do not have [money for] transport I wake up very early at about 6:00 a.m. and start walking. When the [motorcycle taxis] are many, you can plead with one and say, ‘please drop me there.’ When you reach there you make believe it is where you are going. Then you again get someone else, you again plead with that person to drop you somewhere. You keep doing that till the time you reach the destination. If they had brought you straight you would have to pay because no one can bring you up this side without charging. So you get rides in bits until you reach the clinic.” Man, Uganda, Age 37
2. Preserving health through adherence	Experience of improved health after initiating ART	”My health was not good; I would get fevers, headaches and also feel weak. But when I started these drugs of mine, the headaches and fevers stopped. The drugs have changed everything about my life and made it well.” Woman, Uganda, Age 31 “Now I see that I have taken some time without getting sick from flu or cough. This is what causes me to continue swallowing it because now I feel I have good health. So I have to continue swallowing it, to remain healthy.” Woman, Uganda, Age 23
	Desire to preserve the appearance of good health	“I have seen people who are HIV positive refuse to swallow ART drugs...When I see the way they look I really see that they do not look good. So I say to myself, ‘let me swallow my drugs so that I do not become like so and so.’ I swallow my drugs every day at the same time so that it helps my life.” Woman, Uganda, Age 25
	(Pregnant women) ensuring the health of children	“Since I started treatment, I take my pills each day at 8 o’clock because I have a duty...I have a life to take care of.” Woman, S. Africa, Age 22 “I said, ‘let me take the drugs and swallow them so that I do not infect the child. ‘ I have children, and if you refuse to take it you get sick and become bedridden and your children lack someone to take care of them. So that is what forces me to take my drugs. So that I can continue looking after my children, so that they grow and I also get good health.” Woman, Uganda, Age 33
3. Support from others	Reminders to take pills from family and friends	“Most of the time we [my children and I] are together, [and] they will ask, ‘do you know what the time is? It’s almost 9 pm. We are going to watch [TV program]. What about the tablets?’” Woman, S. Africa, Age 38 “In the morning before I go to work you hear [my wife] say, ‘You have not swallowed your drugs.’ That is the help she gives me. She reminds me about my drugs since she knows my status. At times she reminds me about my clinic date. She says, ‘your dates are near.’” Man, Uganda, Age 31 “My friends whom I work with are the ones who say, ‘We are going to put the things [tools] away...have you got out the drugs?’ So when I have forgotten, they at times remind me. When it’s towards evening you hear them say, ‘But [Name], you have not yet swallowed your drugs.’” Man, Uganda, Age 31
	Support from counselors	“[Counselor told me], ‘you are not the only one. All these people you are seeing here at one point were healthy like you were, but they got infected with the disease. So it’s not that when you get AIDS then you should kill yourself or become something else. You have only to be patient and continue to swallow your drugs properly. ‘” Woman, Uganda, Age 31