Brief Enhanced Partner Notification and Risk Reduction Counseling to Prevent Sexually Transmitted Infections, Cape Town, South Africa

BACKGROUND: Evidence-based interventions are needed to stem sexually transmitted infections (STIs). Clinic-delivered counseling remains an important avenue for effective STI prevention. METHODS: A 3-arm randomized clinical trial compared (a) STI health education control condition, (b) risk reduction counseling, and (c) enhanced partner notification counseling. Men and women (n = 1050) were recruited from an STI clinic in Cape Town, South Africa. After baseline assessments, participants were randomly allocated to receive 1 of the 3 single-session counseling interventions and were followed up for 9 months of behavioral assessments and 12 months of electronic medical records abstraction for STI clinic services. RESULTS: Sexual risk reduction counseling reported greater condom use than did the other 2 conditions during the 3 and 6 months follow-ups. In addition, women receiving risk reduction counseling were significantly less likely to have returned for STI clinic services but did not differ in the number of STI clinic visits over the year. CONCLUSIONS: Brief single-session STI prevention counseling demonstrates significant targeted outcomes. The findings suggest that counseling approaches to both increase condom use and enhance partner notification may offer more robust and sustained outcomes and should be tested in future research.