HIV education in a Siberian prison colony for drug dependent males

International Journal for Equity in Health

Bethany White¹  Murdo Bijl²  Kate A Dolan¹ 

[1] Program of International Research and Training (PIRT), National Drug and Alcohol Research Centre, Sydney, NSW 2052, Australia;AIDS Foundation East-West, Moscow, Russia

关键词: health education;    intravenous substance abuse;    harm reduction;    prisons;    Russia;    HIV;   

Others  :  1147777
DOI  :  10.1186/1475-9276-3-7

 received in 2004-02-10, accepted in 2004-06-21,  发布年份 2004

【 摘 要 】

Aim

To evaluate the effectiveness of an HIV peer training program conducted in a colony for drug dependent male prisoners in Siberia, Russia.

Method

Questionnaires were used to collect data pre and post peer training sessions. Three peer training sessions were conducted between questionnaires. Fifteen to twenty inmates were trained as peer educators at each week-long health education training session.

Results

In 2000 and 2001, 153 and 124 inmates completed the questionnaire respectively. Respondents in both years reported similar health and injecting histories and comparable levels of sexual activity. Respondents in 2001 were significantly more likely to correctly identify both how HIV can and cannot be transmitted compared to respondents in 2000. The prevalence of tattooing in prison decreased significantly between questionnaires. However, there was virtually no reported use of bleach to clean tattooing or injecting equipment in either 2000 or 2001. Access to condoms increased significantly between questionnaires.

Conclusions

While this training program was associated with improved HIV knowledge, the Ministry of Justice should consider improved and additional harm reduction strategies. These include increased availability of bleach and condoms and the introduction of methadone treatment and syringe exchange in prison.

【 授权许可】

   
2004 Dolan et al; licensee BioMed Central Ltd. This is an Open Access article: verbatim copying and redistribution of this article are permitted in all media for any purpose, provided this notice is preserved along with the article's original URL.

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