| BACKGROUNDPartner notification is a kind of public health behavior, which can be defined as providing counseling, testing and treatment for the past and present sexual partners of persons with sexually transmitted diseases(STD) or injecting drug users(IDU).Partner notification has been developed into one of the important strategies of STD control and prevention since the early 1900s and has played an important role in reducing high-risk behaviors and in the control of disease outbreaks; Many international organizations regard partner notification as one of the most effective measures of HIV/AIDS control and preventon.The freqency of HIV partner notification is varies among studies, ranging from 27%-69%. Partner notification is associated with expecting the supports of economy, spirit, emotion and society, and lack of partner notification is associated with fearing partner's negative reaction. The main factors related with partner notification are economic status, age, education, religion, self-efficacy, etc. Studies show that partner notification is a cost-effective means to locate additional cases of HIV, chang risk behaviors to reduce the spread of HIV, relieve psychological stress, and reduce the probability of the seperation of the partnership. Some foreign studies, however, have shown that HIV-infected persons could suffer from discrimination, violence and divorce after the partner notification. The implementation of China's Act of AIDS prevention and Treatment has great theoretical and practical significance for HIV partner notification and it is, therefore, important to understand the related factors for partner notification in China.OBJECTIVESTo understand the partner notification status and associated factors among people living with HIV in Lancang County and provide suggestions for developing partner notification strategies in our country.METHODSThe research study took place in Lancang County,Yunnan province from April to August 2009. Study participants were recruited by using convenience sampling. Questionnaire were finished by interviews using face-to-face interviews. Data was collected on demographics,high risk behaviors, and partner notification. Data was entered into EPiData(Odense, Denmark) and analyzed using SPSS 13.0(Chicago,IL).Data were analyzed by frequency,using chi-square tests,and multivariate logistic regression.RESULTSA total of 305 living with HIV/AIDS were surveyed, of these 165 were male and 140 were female. Heterosexual transmission accounts for 66.2%, IDU accounts for 23.6% and both sexual transmission and IDU accounts for 8.2%.Approximately one-fifth (20.2%,22/109) of which HIV-infected with a history of injecting drug use informed their sexual partner, and 79.8%(87/109) did not inform their sexual partner. The main reasons for informing their sexual partner were that they thought their partners would eventually find out about their infection status (36.4%), and that their partners already knew the truth (28.6%). The main reasons for not informing their sexual partners were fear of discrimination (33.3%) and exposing their infection status (25.3%).Among 283 people living with HIV/AIDS reporting a regular sexual partner,61.5% (174/283) informed their regular partners and 37.1% (105/283) failed to inform their regular partners. The reasons for informing regular partners were that spouse already knew the HIV status (47.1%) and expecting to get the spouse's love or console(44.8%). The reasons for not informing regular partners were fear of discrimination 18.1%), and not knowing how to communicate with their partners(16.2%).Multivariate logistic regression analysis showed that AIDS knowledge (OR:4.3; 95% CI: 1.3-14.3; P<0.05), notification location (OR:3.8; 95% CI:1.2-12.7; P<0.05), confirmed time (OR:2.7; 95% CI:1.1-6.5; P<0.05) were associated with whether injecting drug users informed partners of their HIV status. Education level (OR:0.4; 95% CI:0.2-0.9; P<0.05), the main earners of the family (OR:1.9; 95% CI:1.0-3.5; P<0.05), and whether someone else was present during notification(OR:0.4; 95% CI:0.2-0.8; P<0.05) were associated with HIV-infected individuals disclosing their status to regular partners.After the diagnosis of HIV, people that sharing syringes significantly reduced, the frequency of sexual activity with regular partner and noncommercial causal partner significantly decreased, and the rate of condom use with regular sexual partners significantly increased.Compared with those who did not inform their sexual partners, the number of casual sexual partners decreased and condom use significantly increased among the people living with HIV/AIDS and disclosing their status to their sexual partners.CONCLUSIONSThe frequency of partner notification varied among groups. High risk behaviors with regular partners and the number of sexual partners decreased with partner notification, partner notification can impel the sexual partner to seek for medical and health services.Partner notification should be regarded as an effective intervention strategy for HIV/AIDS control and prevention, which is healpful in the digging-out additional HIV cases and reducing high-risk behaviors. Partner notification was associated with high AIDS knowledge, educational level and the quality of voluntary counseling and testing(VCT) services. Future interventions should focus on HIV/AIDS education, improvement in the quality of VCT service, improving quality of VCT service, and the strengthening of psychological services. |
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