The social width of the disease knows no bounds: the media reported the infection of schoolgirls in Akwa Ibom State and the AIDS-death of a community leader in Plateau State in the month of January 1997 alone (Post Express 1997; Punch 1997). [...] Specific sub-problems to investigate include the level of knowledge of nurses on HIV/AIDS; their sources of information on HIV/AIDS; their attitude towards caring for HIV/AIDS patients; the relationships between the nurses' age, exposure to infected patients, years of nursing experience, and the nurses' The attitude of nurses to HIV/AIDS patients in Nigeria 529 attitude towards HIV/AIDS patients;. [...] Findings The unique function of the nurse is to assist the individual, sick or well, in the performance of those activities which contribute to health, to recovery, or to peaceful death, that would be performed by the patient if the patient had the necessary strength, will or knowledge, and to do this in such a way as to help him gain independence as rapidly as possible. [...] This is similar to Plant and Foster's (1993) study in which the overall pattern of response indicated that the highest level of concern was related to the perceived lack of in-service training, the availability of resources to treat infected patients, the issue of keeping The attitude of nurses to HIV/AIDS patients in Nigeria 535 up with current trends and developments, and the lack of experience. [...] The data on the relationship between the knowledge of HIV/AIDS and the nurses' attitude to HIV/AIDS was not significant.