1. Persons living with HIV in sero-discordant partnerships experience improved HIV care engagement compared with persons living with HIV in sero-concordant partnerships: a cross-sectional analysis of four African countries
- Author
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Domonique M. Reed, John Owuoth, Jonah Maswai, Hannah Kibuuka, Michael Iroezindu, Christina S Polyak, Emmanuel Bahemana, Allahna Esber, Julie A Ake, Kavitha Ganesan, and Trevor A Crowell
- Subjects
Cross-sectional study ,Sexual Behavior ,Psychological intervention ,HIV Infections ,Affect (psychology) ,Cohort Studies ,03 medical and health sciences ,0302 clinical medicine ,Virology ,ART uptake ,parasitic diseases ,Humans ,HIV care continuum ,Medicine ,Uganda ,Viral load ,Pharmacology (medical) ,030212 general & internal medicine ,Sero-discordant relationship ,030505 public health ,Sub-Saharan Africa ,biology ,business.industry ,Research ,virus diseases ,RC581-607 ,biology.organism_classification ,Treatment as prevention ,Confidence interval ,Cross-Sectional Studies ,Sexual Partners ,Tanzania ,Molecular Medicine ,Female ,Immunologic diseases. Allergy ,0305 other medical science ,business ,Demography ,Cohort study - Abstract
Background Persons living with HIV (PLWH) who are members of sero-discordant and sero-concordant relationships may experience psychological stressors or motivators that affect HIV care. We assessed the association between sero-discordance status, antiretroviral therapy (ART) uptake, and viral suppression in the African Cohort Study (AFRICOS). Methods AFRICOS enrolls PLWH and HIV-uninfected individuals at 12 sites in Uganda, Kenya, Tanzania, and Nigeria. At enrollment, we determined ART use through self-report. Viral suppression was defined as HIV RNA Results From January 2013 through March 2018, 223 index participants from sero-discordant dyads and 61 from sero-concordant dyads were enrolled. The majority of the indexes were aged 25–34 years (50.2%), female (53.4%), and married (96.5%). Sero-discordant indexes were more likely to disclose their status to partners compared with sero-concordant indexes (96.4% vs. 82.0%, p Conclusions PLWH in sero-discordant sexual partnerships demonstrated improved uptake of ART compared with those in sero-concordant partnerships. Interventions are needed to increase care engagement by individuals in sero-concordant relationships to improve HIV outcomes.
- Published
- 2021
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