Apanga, P.A., Akparibo, R. orcid.org/0000-0003-3751-2432 and Awoonor-Williams, J.K. (2015) Factors influencing uptake of voluntary counselling and testing services for HIV/AIDS in the Lower Manya Krobo Municipality (LMKM) in the Eastern Region of Ghana: a cross-sectional household survey. Journal of Health, Population and Nutrition, 33. 23. ISSN 2072-1315
Abstract
Background Voluntary counselling and testing (VCT) is one of the nine strategies recommended for prevention and control of HIV globally. In this study, we assessed the awareness and utilisation of VCT services among residents of the Lower Manya Krobo Municipality (LMKM) in the Eastern Region of Ghana.
Methods A population-based descriptive cross-sectional survey was conducted with 200 participants, aged between 18 and 55 years. Participants were recruited using cluster and simple random techniques to take part in the survey. Data was analysed descriptively, as well as using regression analysis approach.
Results Ninety-one percent of the respondents surveyed were aware of VCT services for HIV/AIDS. Seventy percent (70 %) have used VCT service in the last 12 months prior to the survey. Of this proportion, 97 % were satisfied with the quality of VCT services offered and indicated their willingness to recommend the service to others. Participants desire to know their HIV status (40 %), referral by health workers (25 %), and participants who wanted to get married (11 %) were the main reasons for increased uptake. Participants who had formal education, primary (OR = 1.8 (95 % CI 1.25–2.84)), junior high school (OR = 2.3 (95 % CI 1.54–3.37)), senior high school (OR = 2.8 (95 % CI 1.73–4.78)), and tertiary (OR = 3.4 (95 % CI 1.98–8.42)), had increased chance of using VCT service compared with participants who had no education (p < 0.001). Reasons for non-utilisation of VCT service were lack of awareness of the VCT service in the area (32 %), fear of being stigmatised (53 %), and the belief that HIV/AIDS cannot be cured and therefore the lack of need (5 %).
Conclusions Although awareness and utilisation of VCT service rates were reportedly high, more efforts need to be done in order to increase awareness and promote utilisation. HIV/AIDS educational campaign programmes need to be strongly pursued, with emphasis on the benefits of VCT services. This has the potential of reducing stigma and increase utilisation.
Metadata
Item Type: | Article |
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Authors/Creators: |
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Copyright, Publisher and Additional Information: | © 2015 Apanga et al. Open Access: This article is distributed under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution 4.0 International License (http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/), which permits unrestricted use, distribution, and reproduction in any medium, provided you give appropriate credit to the original author(s) and the source, provide a link to the Creative Commons license, and indicate if changes were made. The Creative Commons Public Domain Dedication waiver (http://creativecommons.org/publicdomain/zero/1.0/) applies to the data made available in this article, unless otherwise stated. |
Keywords: | HIV; AIDS; VCT; Uptake; Awareness; Ghana |
Dates: |
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Institution: | The University of Sheffield |
Academic Units: | The University of Sheffield > Faculty of Medicine, Dentistry and Health (Sheffield) > School of Health and Related Research (Sheffield) > ScHARR - Sheffield Centre for Health and Related Research |
Funding Information: | Funder Grant number OXFAM nan |
Depositing User: | Symplectic Sheffield |
Date Deposited: | 01 Oct 2020 15:00 |
Last Modified: | 01 Oct 2020 15:06 |
Status: | Published |
Publisher: | BMC |
Refereed: | Yes |
Identification Number: | 10.1186/s41043-015-0035-8 |
Related URLs: | |
Open Archives Initiative ID (OAI ID): | oai:eprints.whiterose.ac.uk:166241 |