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National Trends in Sexual Behavior, Substance Use and HIV Testing Among United States Men Who have Sex with Men Recruited Online, 2013 Through 2017

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Abstract

The American Men’s Internet Survey (AMIS) is conducted annually with 10,000 men age 15 + who have sex with men (MSM). Modeling was used with 39,863 AMIS surveys from 4 cycles between December 2013 to February 2017 to identify temporal trends in sexual behavior, substance use, and testing behavior (within 12 months preceding interview) stratified by participants’ self-reported HIV status. HIV-negative/unknown status MSM had significant increases in condomless anal intercourse (CAI), marijuana use, use of other illicit substances, sexually transmitted infection (STI) diagnoses, and HIV or STI testing (testing only increased among MSM age 25 +). HIV-negative/unknown status MSM had significant decrease in CAI with an HIV-positive or unknown status partner. HIV-positive MSM had significant increases in CAI, methamphetamine use, and STI diagnoses/testing. Although encouraging, the few indicators of improvement in HIV/STI sexual health practices are not consistently seen across sub-groups of MSM and may be counteracted by growing proportions of MSM engaging in CAI and acquiring STIs.

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Notes

  1. MSAs included in NHBS are: : Atlanta, GA; Baltimore, MD; Boston, MA; Chicago, IL; Dallas, TX; Denver, CO; Detroit, MI; Houston, TX; Los Angeles, CA; Miami, FL; Nassau-Suffolk, NY; New Orleans, LA, New York City, NY; Newark, NJ; Philadelphia, PA; San Diego, CA; San Francisco, CA; San Juan, PR; Seattle, WA; Washington, DC.

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Acknowledgements

The study was funded by a grant from the MAC AIDS Fund and by the National Institutes of Health [P30AI050409]—the Emory Center for AIDS Research.

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Authors and Affiliations

  1. Rollins School of Public Health, Emory University, 1518 Clifton Road, Atlanta, GA, 30322, USA

    Travis H. Sanchez, Maria Zlotorzynska, R. Craig Sineath, Erin Kahle & Patrick S. Sullivan

  2. Booz Allen Hamilton, 901 15th St NW, Washington, DC, USA

    Stephen Tregear

Authors
  1. Travis H. Sanchez
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  2. Maria Zlotorzynska
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  3. R. Craig Sineath
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  4. Erin Kahle
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Contributions

TS, CS, ST and PS developed the research questions, designed the study and materials. TS, MZ, CS, EK and ST implemented the study data collection and contributed to dataset creation over the multiple cycles. MZ conducted the data analyses for this manuscript. TS, MZ and PS wrote the manuscript. All authors critically reviewed and edited the manuscript.

Corresponding author

Correspondence to Travis H. Sanchez.

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Conflict of interest

The authors report no conflict of interest.

Ethical Approval

The study was conducted in compliance with Federal Regulations Governing Protection of Human Subjects and was reviewed and approved by Emory University’s Institutional Review Board.

Informed Consent

Informed consent was obtained from all individual participants in the study.

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Sanchez, T.H., Zlotorzynska, M., Sineath, R.C. et al. National Trends in Sexual Behavior, Substance Use and HIV Testing Among United States Men Who have Sex with Men Recruited Online, 2013 Through 2017. AIDS Behav 22, 2413–2425 (2018). https://doi.org/10.1007/s10461-018-2168-4

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  • DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/s10461-018-2168-4

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