Medicine and Health Sciences Commons^™

“It Really Proves To Us That We Are Still Valuable”: Qualitative Research To Inform A Safer Conception Intervention For Men Living With Hiv In South Africa, Lynn T. Matthews, Letitia Greener, Hazar Khidir, Christina Psaros, Abigail Harrison, F. Nzwakie Mosery, Mxolisi Mathenjwa, Kasey O'Neil, Cecilia Milford, Steven A. Safren, David R. Bangsberg, Jennifer A. Smit

OHSU-PSU School of Public Health Faculty Publications and Presentations

Objective: Many men living with HIV want to have children. Opportunities to reduce periconception HIV transmission include antiretroviral therapy as prevention, pre-exposure prophylaxis, limiting condomless sex to peak fertility, and sperm processing. Whether men have knowledge of or want to adopt these strategies remains unknown.

Methods: We conducted focus group discussions (FGDs) with men accessing HIV care in South Africa in 2014 to inform a safer conception intervention for men. Eligible men were 25–45 years old, living with HIV, not yet accessing treatment, and wanting to have a child with an HIV-negative or unknown serostatus female partner (referred …

Adherence To Hiv Antiretroviral Therapy Among Pregnant And Postpartum Women During The Option B+ Era: 12-Month Cohort Study In Urban South Africa And Rural Uganda, Lynn T. Matthews, Catherine Orrell, Mwebesa B. Bwana, Alexander C. Tsai, Christina A. Psaros, Stephen Asiimwe, Gideon Amanyire, Nicholas Musinguzi, Kathleen Bell, David Bangsberg, Jessica E. Haberer

OHSU-PSU School of Public Health Faculty Publications and Presentations

Introduction: We conducted a cohort study to understand patterns of anti-retroviral therapy (ART) adherence during pregnancy, postpartum and non-pregnancy follow-up among women initiating ART in public clinics offering Option B+ in rural Uganda and urban South Africa. Methods: We collected survey data, continuously monitored ART adherence (Wisepill), HIV-RNA and pregnancy tests at zero, six and twelve months from women initiating ART in Uganda and South Africa, 2015 to 2017. The primary predictor of interest was follow-up time categorized as pregnant (pregnancy diagnosis to pregnancy end), postpartum (pregnancy end to study exit) or non-pregnancy-related (neither pregnant nor postpartum). Fractional regression …

Super Learner Analysis Of Real-Time Electronically Monitored Adherence To Antiretroviral Therapy Under Constrained Optimization And Comparison To Non-Differentiated Care Approaches For Persons Living With Hiv In Rural Uganda, Alejandra E. Benitez, Nicholas Musinguzi, David Bangsberg, Mwebesa B. Bwana, Conrad Muzoora, Peter Hunt, Jeffrey N. Martin, Jessica E. Haberer, Maya L. Petersen

OHSU-PSU School of Public Health Faculty Publications and Presentations

Introduction

Real‐time electronic adherence monitoring (EAM) systems could inform on‐going risk assessment for HIV viraemia and be used to personalize viral load testing schedules. We evaluated the potential of real‐time EAM (transferred via cellular signal) and standard EAM (downloaded via USB cable) in rural Uganda to inform individually differentiated viral load testing strategies by applying machine learning approaches.

Methods

We evaluated an observational cohort of persons living with HIV and treated with antiretroviral therapy (ART) who were monitored longitudinally with standard EAM from 2005 to 2011 and real‐time EAM from 2011 to 2015. Super learner, an ensemble machine learning method, …