VANCOUVER, British Columbia -- Nearly a third of patients diagnosed with HIV feel their lives actually improved after discovering they had the affliction, according to a U.S. study released on Thursday.

Thirty-two percent of the 449 people with the virus that causes AIDS who were interviewed for the study said their lives got better after being diagnosed HIV positive because they became less worried about financial and other problems.

Twenty-nine percent said life was worse and 26 percent said it was about the same. Thirteen percent said they did not know.

The study's results were presented on Thursday in Vancouver at the annual meeting at the Society of General Internal Medicine.

Study director Joel Tsevat of the University of Cincinnati Medical Center said the findings fit with anecdotal reports from nurses and psychologists, as well as the results a smaller study he conducted in the mid-1990s.

Many of the patients with improved outlooks said they were getting more out of life than before the diagnosis. "They don't take things for granted like they used to, such as a nice day," Tsevat told Reuters.

Those patients also tended to be more involved in non-organized religious activities, although Tsevat said it was unclear if that was a cause of their improved outlook on life or the result of it.

The percentage of people who felt their lives were better was roughly the same in all three classes of HIV patients: Those without AIDS symptoms, those with symptoms but without AIDS, and those with AIDS. More work needed

The researchers said it was important to find out more about why some patients have an improved outlook on life so that information can be used to help those who feel their lives have become worse.

Tsevat cautioned that because the research was done on patients in the United States, it might not apply to those living with HIV in countries that do not have the same level of medical and welfare support systems.

Tsevat also warned that the results were not an excuse for people to be less concerned about the disease or their own medical safety. "That would send the wrong message," he said.

The study was funded by the U.S. Department of Veterans Affairs and the National Center for Complementary and Alternative Medicine. Interviews were conducted in 2002 and 2003 in three U.S. cities.

The researchers will continue to track the patients they interviewed over the next 15 months, with the hope their findings will help develop ways of helping people cope with the illnesses.