Knowledge, attitudes and related factors among men who have sex with men in HIV pre-exposure prophylaxis (PrEP) in Can Tho, 2022

Abstract

Faced with the continuous increase in HIV prevalence among men who have sex with men (MSM), Vietnam has implemented a model of HIV pre-exposure prophylaxis (PrEP) for this group of people. To describe knowledge and attitudes regarding HIV pre-exposure prophylaxis, a cross-sectional descriptive study on 484 MSMs in Can Tho was carried out in 2022. The results showed that the knowledge of the subjects about HIV and PrEP had a high rate of 91.3% and 83.9%, respectively, and the general knowledge reached 92.6%. The majority of subjects had a positive attitude about HIV preexposure prophylaxis (75.2%). In the process of using PrEP, the most interesting information was “drug side effects,” accounting for 71.1%, followed by “how effective the drug is,” with 67.8%. The group of subjects participating in the LGBT community is 3.36 times more likely to have knowledge and understanding about PrEP and a 1.56 times more positive attitude than the non-participant group. The group with knowledge and understanding about HIV is 4.2 times more likely to have knowledge about PrEP and 3.36 times more likely to have a positive attitude. Subjects with good knowledge of PrEP are 9.79 times more likely to have a positive attitude than those with poor knowledge of PrEP.