The association between egocentric sexual networks and sexual meeting venues with PrEP conversation and encouragement for use among Latinx men who have sex with men

ABSTRACT

Despite the increasing availability of pre-exposure prophylaxis (PrEP), Latinx men who have sex with men (LMSM) are not receiving PrEP-related information. To understand the influence of LMSM sexual networks on PrEP-related conversations and encouragement to use PrEP, this cross-sectional egocentric network study characterized the PrEP-related communication of 130 LMSM egos with 507 sexual partners (alters). Participants were recruited using respondent-driven sampling methods from a Miami-Dade County community-health organization. Egocentric-level data were collected from 2018–2019 and analyzed using multilevel modeling. Of egos, 30% reported using PrEP. Closeness between participants and sexual partners played a role in PrEP conversation and encouragement. Participants believed they would have less success convincing sexual partners to use PrEP if partners were older. Participants perceived higher likelihood to talk about PrEP or success in encouraging alters to use PrEP if, relative to meeting sexual partners on Grindr, they met at a friend’s party, gay-centric community event, or school/work. Given that increased closeness and in-person sexual partner meeting venues are associated with PrEP information dissemination and encouragement, social network-based interventions can capitalize on PrEP navigators who run network visualizations, and with this information develop a longitudinal plan to increase PrEP conversation and encouragement as needed for each network.

KEYWORDS:

• Social network analysis
• HIV
• Latino men who have sex with men

Disclosure statement

The author(s) declared the following potential conflicts of interest with respect to the research, authorship, and/or publication of this article: Dr. Kanamori has served as on a scientific advisory board for Latinos Salud and Dr. Doblecki-Lewis has served as on a scientific advisory board for Gilead Sciences. Dr. Fallon is the Executive Director of Latinos Salud.

Additional information

Funding

Research reported in this publication was supported by the National Institute on Drug Abuse (award #K99DA041494; R00DA041494 PI: Kanamori); National Institute of Allergy and Infectious Diseases (award #P30AI050409 CFAR Adelante Sub-award PI: Kanamori); the National Institute on Minority Health and Health Disparities (Awards #F31MD015988 PI: Shrader; U54MD002266 PI: Behar-Zusman); and the National Institute of Mental Health (Award #R01MH125727 PI: Kanamori; P30MH116867 PI: Safren, Sub-award PI: Kanamori) of the National Institutes of Health. The content is solely the responsibility of the authors and does not necessarily represent the official views of the National Institute on Drug Abuse, the National Institute on Minority Health and Health Disparities, the National Institute of Allergy and Infectious Diseases, the National Institute of Mental Health, or the National Institutes of Health.