Acceptability and Preliminary Efficacy of an Online HIV Prevention Intervention for Single Young Men Who Have Sex with Men Seeking Partners Online: The myDEx Project

A Systematic Review of eHealth Interventions Addressing HIV/STI Prevention Among Men Who Have Sex With Men

“…Sexual risk behaviors were the most common primary outcomes (n = 32 studies), following by HIV/STI testing and self-testing (n = 18 studies) and HIV/STI disclosure, stigma, self-esteem, and internalized homonegativity (n = 9 studies). Several studies focused on HIV/STI prevention knowledge and attitudes [47,56,67,86,87], HIV disclosure [60,62,79,[87][88][89], gonorrhea and chlamydial infection and treatment [90], or pre-exposure prophylaxis uptake [57,91] and adherence [92,93]. Reback et al (2012) had an additional outcome regarding the frequency of methamphetamine use among MSM [50], and Hightow-Weidman et al (2019) investigated the intention to use a condom, attitudes toward safe sexual behaviours, condom use self-efficacy, depressive symptoms, social support and social isolation [49].…”

“…All studies targeted MSM in accordance with the inclusion criteria. Several studies focused on specific parts of the MSM population such as rural MSM [46,47], black MSM [48,49], methamphetamine-using MSM [50,51], HIV + MSM [52][53][54] and young MSM [55][56][57][58]. Study sample size ranged from 41 [59] to 3092 men [60].…”

“…Two studies using smartphone applications (apps) are pilot RCTs [57,68], and one study was pilot pre-post experiment [78]. Bauermeister et al developed an application with six sessions based on the Dual Processing Cognitive-Emotional Decision-Making Framework [57]. Each session addressed different cognitive and affective content areas via various interactive and tailored activities.…”

“…Each session addressed different cognitive and affective content areas via various interactive and tailored activities. Meanwhile, the control group only received an application having six sessions with the contents from Centers for Disease Control and Prevention's HIV Risk Reduction Tool [57]. However, results indicated that intervention group was less likely to report foregoing condoms (OR = 0.43, 95% CI 0.28-1.44) compared to the control group (p < 0.01), while no differences were found in other sexual risk behavior, HIV testing and PrEP uptake between two arms [57].…”

“…Meanwhile, the control group only received an application having six sessions with the contents from Centers for Disease Control and Prevention's HIV Risk Reduction Tool [57]. However, results indicated that intervention group was less likely to report foregoing condoms (OR = 0.43, 95% CI 0.28-1.44) compared to the control group (p < 0.01), while no differences were found in other sexual risk behavior, HIV testing and PrEP uptake between two arms [57]. In contrast, Zhu et al built a "WeTest"-a WeChat group to provide app-based messages and referrals to health services related to HIV [68].…”