Where Do Health Professions Students Learn About Pre-exposure Prophylaxis (PrEP) for HIV Prevention?

ABSTRACT: HIV pre-exposure prophylaxis (PrEP) is critical for ending the HIV epidemic, and a necessary part of health professions education. We present data from a US survey study (N = 2085) about educational experiences (coursework and extracurricular), in which medical, physician assistant, nursing, and pharmacy students received training about HIV risk factors and PrEP. We found a discrepancy between the percentage of courses covering HIV risk factors (84.7%) compared to PrEP (54.6%) for all students (P < .001), and specifically among final-year students (92.0% vs. 59.7%; P < .001). Pharmacology courses were the most common exposure to PrEP (46.0%), and 61.3% of students were introduced to PrEP through an extracurricular experience. Health professions education must present HIV risk factors in conjunction with PrEP.

Supplementary information

The online version contains supplementary material available at 10.1007/s40670-021-01265-3.

SUBMITTER: Bunting SR 

PROVIDER: S-EPMC8368481 | biostudies-literature | 2021 Apr

REPOSITORIES: biostudies-literature