Abstract
Background: Developing effective interventions which increase HIV testing amongst gay men is a priority across Europe. Understanding enduring barriers to testing is thus critical.
Methods: Cross sectional surveys were conducted within the commercial gay scene in Scotland using tried and tested ways of recruiting gay men through time and location sampling (n ¼ 1382) in 2000 and 2010.
Results: Significant changes in a range of HIV testing behaviours were observed between time points (e.g. rates of ever testing and recency of testing). At the
community level, some significant changes in perceptions of barriers to testing were found (p5 0.001). Multinomial logistic regression showed that fear of a positive test result remained a key enduring barrier to HIV testing when controlling for time and the effects of all other variables (p5 0.001).
Discussion: These findings suggest the potential utility of designing and
evaluating interventions which attend to both the biomedical and the psychosocial aspects of HIV testing
Methods: Cross sectional surveys were conducted within the commercial gay scene in Scotland using tried and tested ways of recruiting gay men through time and location sampling (n ¼ 1382) in 2000 and 2010.
Results: Significant changes in a range of HIV testing behaviours were observed between time points (e.g. rates of ever testing and recency of testing). At the
community level, some significant changes in perceptions of barriers to testing were found (p5 0.001). Multinomial logistic regression showed that fear of a positive test result remained a key enduring barrier to HIV testing when controlling for time and the effects of all other variables (p5 0.001).
Discussion: These findings suggest the potential utility of designing and
evaluating interventions which attend to both the biomedical and the psychosocial aspects of HIV testing
| Original language | English |
|---|---|
| Publication status | Published - 2012 |
Keywords
- HIV testing behaviours
- gay men
- Scotland
- cross sectional surveys