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Pre-exposure prophylaxis PrEP is an evidence-based new biomedical HIV prevention intervention, which involves the pre-emptive use of daily or event-based antiretroviral drugs, to reduce risk of HIV acquisition if exposed. PrEP has recently been positioned as an integral prevention tool to reduce HIV acquisition risk among men who have sex with men MSM at country-level and within global prevention strategies.
Given this global scale up of PrEP, we conducted a scoping review of extant international literature documenting service related perspectives, models and lessons learnt in PrEP programming for MSM. A systematic search of literature was conducted, and restricted to English language records in the timeframe to February Eligibility criteria centered on whether studies broadly described PrEP programming and service delivery for MSM as well as health communication.
Following exclusion of ineligible records and removal of duplicates, 84 records were charted and thematically analysed according to scoping review methods. The review highlights the complexities in providing optimal PrEP services for MSM by mapping and illustrating the importance of understanding the informal and formal routes to PrEP use among this HIV risk population; the barriers to uptake; the requirement for the presence of a positive therapeutic alliance between patient and prescriber in supporting patient initiation and adherence to PrEP regimes; and the need for availability in different culturally and ethnically sensitive models of PrEP service delivery according to low to high risk groups within the MSM communities.
The online version of this article The five prevention pillars are a combination prevention approach involving sexual education and economic empowerment to women, human rights programmes for key populations, condom programmes, voluntary medical male circumcision, and the use of pre-exposure prophylaxis PrEP [ 1 ].
