You are here

  • Home
  • Archive
  • Volume 10, Issue 4
  • Effect of a web drama video series on HIV and other sexually transmitted infection testing among gay, bisexual and queer men: study protocol for a community-based, pragmatic randomised controlled trial in Singapore: the People Like Us (PLU) Evaluation St…

Article Text

Article menu

Download PDFPDF

XML
Sexual health
Protocol
Effect of a web drama video series on HIV and other sexually transmitted infection testing among gay, bisexual and queer men: study protocol for a community-based, pragmatic randomised controlled trial in Singapore: the People Like Us (PLU) Evaluation Study
  1. Rayner Kay Jin Tan1,
  2. Wee Ling Koh1,
  3. Daniel Le2,
  4. Avin Tan2,
  5. Adrian Tyler2,
  6. Calvin Tan2,
  7. Sumita Banerjee2,
  8. Chen Seong Wong3,4,
  9. Mee-Lian Wong1,
  10. Martin Tze-Wei Chio5,
  11. Mark I-Cheng Chen1,3
  1. 1Saw Swee Hock School of Public Health, National University of Singapore and National University Health System, Singapore
  2. 2Action for AIDS Singapore, Singapore
  3. 3National Centre for Infectious Diseases, Singapore
  4. 4Yong Loo Lin School of Medicine, National University of Singapore, Singapore
  5. 5Department of STI Control (DSC) Clinic, National Skin Centre, Singapore
  1. Correspondence to Mr Rayner Kay Jin Tan; rayner.tan{at}u.nus.edu

Abstract

Introduction Gay, bisexual and queer (GBQ) men are at disproportionately higher risk of acquiring HIV and other sexually transmitted infections (STI). While HIV/STI testing rates among GBQ men are increasing worldwide, they remain suboptimal in a variety of settings.

Methods and analysis The study is a pragmatic randomised controlled trial designed to evaluate an online video series developed by a community-based organisation in Singapore for GBQ men. A total of 300 HIV-negative GBQ men in Singapore aged 18–29 years old will be recruited for this study. Participants will subsequently be randomised into the intervention arm (n=150) and the control arm (n=150). The intervention arm (n=150) will be assigned the intervention along with sexual health information via a pamphlet, while the control group (n=150) will be assigned only the sexual health information via a pamphlet. Participants should also not have watched the video prior to their participation in this study, which will be ascertained through a questionnaire. Primary outcomes for this evaluation are changes in self-reported intention to test for, actual testing for and regularity of testing for HIV, syphilis, chlamydia and gonorrhoea at the 3 and 6 months after intervention. Secondary outcomes include changes in self-reported risk perception for HIV and other STIs, knowledge of HIV, knowledge of risks associated with acquiring STIs, knowledge of HIV pre-exposure prophylaxis, consistent condom use for anal sex with casual partners, incidence of STIs, connectedness to the lesbian, gay, bisexual and transgender community, self-concealment of sexual orientation, perceived homophobia, internalised homophobia, HIV testing self-efficacy and HIV testing social norms.

Ethics and dissemination The study has been approved by the National University of Singapore Institutional Review Board (S-19-059) and registered at ClinicalTrials.gov. The results will be published in peer-reviewed academic journals and disseminated to community-based organisations and policymakers.

Trial registration number NCT04021953

  • HIV & AIDS
  • infectious diseases
  • epidemiology
  • public health
  • social medicine
http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc/4.0/

This is an open access article distributed in accordance with the Creative Commons Attribution Non Commercial (CC BY-NC 4.0) license, which permits others to distribute, remix, adapt, build upon this work non-commercially, and license their derivative works on different terms, provided the original work is properly cited, appropriate credit is given, any changes made indicated, and the use is non-commercial. See: http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc/4.0/.

https://doi.org/10.1136/bmjopen-2019-033855

Statistics from Altmetric.com

    Request Permissions

    If you wish to reuse any or all of this article please use the link below which will take you to the Copyright Clearance Center’s RightsLink service. You will be able to get a quick price and instant permission to reuse the content in many different ways.

    View Full Text

    Footnotes

    • Contributors RKJT and WLK wrote the first draft of the protocol. DL, AvT, AdT, CT and SB developed the materials for the intervention condition and contributed to the details of the intervention in the manuscript. MTWC provided access to the standard of care condition. RKJT, CSW, MLW and MICC obtained funding for the research. All authors conceived the study and revised the manuscript for relevant scientific content in the final version of the manuscript.

    • Funding This work was supported by Infectious Diseases Programme Research Grant, Saw Swee Hock School of Public Health, National University of Singapore (SSHSPH ID-PRG/SeedFund/2018/03).

    • Competing interests None declared.

    • Patient and public involvement Patients and/or the public were not involved in the design, or conduct, or reporting, or dissemination plans of this research.

    • Patient consent for publication Not required.

    • Ethics approval Ethics approval for the protocol was obtained from the National University of Singapore Institutional Review Board (Reference number S-19-059).

    • Provenance and peer review Not commissioned; externally peer reviewed.