Disjuncture between self-perceived and clinically assessed risk of HIV among gay, bisexual, and other men who have sex with men in Ontario and British Columbia, Canada

BACKGROUND: Self-perceived and clinically assessed HIV risk do not always align.

We compared self-perceived and clinically assessed risk of HIV and the reasons for self-perceived low risk of HIV among gay, bisexual, and other men who have sex with men (GBM) from large urban centers in Ontario and British Columbia, Canada.

METHODS: Never PrEP users recruited from sexual health clinics or online, completed a cross-sectional survey between July/2019 and August/2020.

We contrasted self-perceived HIV risk against criteria from the Canadian PrEP guidelines and participants were categorized as concordant or discordant.

We used content analysis to categorize participants’ free-text explanations for perceived low HIV risk.

These were compared with answers to quantitative responses about condomless sex acts and number of partners.

RESULTS: Of 315 GBM who self-perceived low risk of HIV, 146 (46%) were considered at high risk according to the guidelines.

Participants with discordant assessment were younger, had less years of formal education, were more often in an open relationship and were more likely to self-identify as gay.

Reasons for self-perceived low HIV risk in the discordant group were condom use (27%), being in a committed relationship/having one main partner (15%), having no or infrequent anal sex (12%) and having few partners (10%).

CONCLUSIONS: There is a disjuncture between self-perceived and clinically assessed risk of HIV.

Some GBM may underestimate their HIV risk and clinical criteria may overestimate risk.

Bridging these gaps requires efforts to increase HIV risk awareness in the community, and refinement of clinical assessments based on individualized discussions between the provider and the user.