Boston University researchers discovered that cocaine and heroin users have less sex while high after being voluntarily tested and counseled for HIV and sexually transmitted infections, according to a press release.
School of Medicine and Boston Medical Center researchers published a study online in Academic Energy Medicine Monday, according to a Tuesday press release. The study highlighted tests researchers performed on users treated in the emergency department and given referrals for drug treatment over four years.
From 2004 to 2008, researchers screened more than 46,000 urban patients ages 18 to 54. More than a thousand enrolled in the study.
“Our study findings represent the largest published data set of HIV/STI screening and testing and subsequent changes in sexual risk behaviors among a diverse [emergency department] patient population of cocaine and heroin users,” Edward Bernstein, a professor and BMC physician, said in the release.
Through six- and 12-month check-ins, researchers found, in addition to having less sex while high, participants increased condom use.
“The increase in condom use and the decrease in sex while high support the importance of easy access to HIV counseling and testing and [emergency department] drug screening and referral treatment,” Bernstein said.
Males, older patients and HIV positive patients were those more likely to use condoms in sexual encounters.
Sexual risk behaviors are a greater source of HIV transmission than injection drug use in the United States, according to the release.
This is an account occasionally used by the Daily Free Press editors to post archived posts from previous iterations of the site or otherwise for special circumstance publications. See authorship info on the byline at the top of the page.
