Improving sexual healthcare in general practice

Objective: Describe how different types of resources are received and perceived by primary care clinicians to improve sexual healthcare. Study design: Cross-sectional online survey of primary care clinicians in New South Wales, Australia, to evaluate the perceived impact of nine resources to promote sexual healthcare—seven were tailored to general practitioners (GPs) and two to practice nurses (PNs). Participants: 431 primary care clinicians (GPs=214; PNs=217). Main outcome measures: Awareness, use and perceived impact of the resources. Principal findings: Most GPs were aware of and used the Sexually Transmitted Infections (STI) Testing Tool; the Online STI Testing Tool GP training was perceived to improve GPs' ability to raise the topic of STIs with patients and order appropriate tests. Although the highest proportion of PNs were aware of the online STI PN training, most used the PN Postcard. The former helped to improve PNs' ability to identify at-risk patients and document sexual history. Conclusions: This study supports the need for a multimodal approach to improve the delivery of sexual healthcare in general practice. This would involve the communication of similar messages in different modes, via different channels, at different times.