Assisted Notification of Partners of Men Having Sex With Men Discovering Their Seropositivity

The pourcentage of partners notified one month after the intervention, among the number of exposed partners stated by index patients

The context of HIV has changed dramatically this last two decades with the availability of
 highly active and well tolerated antiretroviral therapies, and the extension of prevention
 methods to include treatment as prevention of onward transmissions. It is time to test and
 treat as many HIV infected people as possible. HIV testing that target people known to have
 been exposed to HIV is an interesting option to explore to curb the spread of the epidemic.
 Notifying HIV exposed sexual partner for them to get an HIV test and treatment contribute to
 reduce HIV transmissions. The partner notification (PN) gives the opportunity to HIV positive
 partners to access to care and negative partners, access to prevention services.
 
 Several tools have been developed worldwide, in particular in the United Kingdom and the US,
 to help HIV or index patients to notify their sexual partner or needle-sharing people. This
 approach is new in France and PN intervention has to be assessed.
 
 The present study aimed to assess the effectiveness of a digital PN tool or a counselling
 interview to help men having sex with men (MSM) newly diagnosed for HIV to notify their
 exposed partners. The study also aimed to evaluate the acceptability of these PN intervention
 in index patients and their notified partners in the French context.
 
 To meet the objectives, we developed an interventional study in index patients (described
 above) coupled with :
 
 - an observational study in notified partners to assess their PN acceptability and their
 HIV testing uptake after being notified
 
 - a qualitative study in a sample of index patients and notified partner to assess more in
 depth their PN acceptability.
 
 Expected results and perspectives Feasible and effective, assisted PN services may complete
 HIV testing offer (and by extension sexually transmitted infections screening) as well as the
 prevention offer Pre-Exposure Prophylaxis (PrEP) for MSM.
 
 The study will provide information enabling the best practice guides. In a next step, PN
 interventions adapted to other key populations will be studied.