Home based human immunodeficiency virus (HIV) testing intervention in a rural community in South Africa

Rates of HIV testing will be assessed in the post-intervention community survey in intervention and control arms. Questions to assess this outcome will include history of VCT, number of tests in the past year, and location/s where VCT was obtained. For each community, age and gender specific testing rates will be calculated.

1. Disclosure of HIV status: the post-intervention survey questions will ask about disclosure of serostatus to spouses, sexual partners and family members. The proportion of respondents reporting each disclosure type will be calculated.
2. Access to HIV care and treatment for individuals who are HIV positive: the post-intervention survey will have questions on access to HIV treatment for individuals testing HIV positive within the previous 12 to 18 months
3. HIV risk behaviour: HIV risk behaviours will be assessed using standardised questionnaire items that have been used previously in international settings. Risks include recent (one-month), intermediate (three-month) and longer-term (one-year), and lifetime measures of sexual behaviour (by partner gender, type of activity, condom use), using partner-by-partner elicitation (up to 5 individuals). We will include measures of relationship type (spouse, friend, casual acquaintance, commercial, etc). Algorithms will be developed to produce easily understood outcome measures (e.g., frequency of unprotected intercourse; proportion of acts using a condom).
4. Uptake of AZT and nevirapine amongst HIV positive pregnant women: women who have delivered a baby within the year prior to the post-intervention survey will be asked if they knew their HIV status and if they received AZT and nevirapine during pregnancy and labour