Missed opportunities for healthcare providers to discuss HIV preexposure prophylaxis with people who inject drugs.

OBJECTIVE

To identify missed opportunities for healthcare providers to discuss HIV pre-exposure prophylaxis (PrEP) with people who inject drugs (PWID).

METHODS

Participants were 395 HIV-negative PWID recruited for the 2018 National HIV Behavioral Surveillance survey in San Francisco, California via respondent-driven sampling. Adjusted logistic regression tested whether discussing PrEP with a provider in the last year was associated with sociodemographic characteristics, structural factors, and accessing HIV/STI and substance use treatment services.

RESULTS

Most PWID (86.3%) reported seeing a healthcare provider, but only 15.0% of these reported discussing PrEP with a healthcare provider. PWID who were sexual minority men had greater odds of having a discussion about PrEP with a healthcare provider than PWID who were heterosexual men (aOR=3.42, 95% CI=1.21-9.73) or heterosexual women (aOR=3.69, 95% CI=1.08-12.62). Additionally, factors associated with discussing PrEP included: being tested for HIV (aOR=4.29, 95% CI=1.21-15.29), having a healthcare provider recommend HIV testing (aOR=2.95, 95% CI=1.23-7.06), and receiving free condoms from a prevention program (aOR=5.45, 95% CI=1.78-16.65).

CONCLUSIONS

In the face of low PrEP uptake, continuing HIV transmission, and many missed opportunities to discussed PrEP (e.g., PWID who are women, substance use treatment services), these findings from San Francisco indicate that healthcare providers and public health efforts need to systematically offer PrEP to PWID. Additional research may clarify missed opportunities in other locations as well as the impact of COVID-19.