# Presentation: 167380

## Alcohol and HIV Risk Behaviors

- Michael D. Stein, M.D.
- Professor of Medicine & Community Health
- Warren Alpert Medical School of Brown University

## Objectives

- Methodological Issues in Alcohol Use and Sexual Risk Research
- Approaches to Investigating the Connection of Alcohol and Sexual Risk
- Event Level Analysis: A Daily Diary Study
- A Conceptual Model of Alcohol Use in Sexual Situations
- Interventions Strategies and Conclusions

## The Relations Between Alcoholic Indulgence and Venereal Disease: JAMA 1901

- “Of all the infectious diseases, there is none so easily and surely avoidable...as the venereal diseases.”
- “Alcohol increases sexual desire, while it blunts the moral sense and lowers the power of resistance...It increases indifference to the results of intercourse and carelessness in their prevention.”

## JAMA 1901

- 	Gonorrhea:  114 cases
- 		1 in state of “chronic alcoholism”
- 		12 in “acute alcoholic intoxication”
- 		42 in “mild alcoholic stimulation”
- 		59 in “state of sobriety”
- 	“It is properly not contended that the infecting coitus would not have taken place in all instances in the absence of alcoholic indulgence, but it seems likely that it would not have occurred in most instances, and that in those instance in which it had taken place precautionary measures would otherwise have been adopted.”

## Current Drinking and Episodic Heavy Drinking by Age

- NESARC 2001-2002

## Two Fields: Alcohol and Sexual Risk Research

- Measurement issues
- Study design: observational
- Self-report validity
- Heterogeneous Risk Populations
- The precise relationship between alcohol and sexual risk is unclear

## Measures

- Any Alcohol
- Quantity/Frequency
- Specific Situation Use
- Problem Drinking
- (binge,intoxication, DSM disorder, weekly)

- Any unsafe intercourse
- Frequency of Unsafe intercourse
- New Partner
- Number of Partners
- STI

## Methodological Approaches to Investigating the Connection of Alcohol and Sexual Risk

- •	Global Association
- Situational Covariation
- Event level Analyses

## Event-Level Association

- A specific event of drinking prior to sex is paired with an event of unprotected sex occurring that same day
- Single, multiple, daily diary
- Daily diaries reduce recall errors and biases (Tennen & Affleck, 1996)
- Research Support
- Little published using event level studies among HIV-positive individuals in the U.S. or Africa
- One single-event study among HIV-positive individuals in the U.S. found a positive association (Kalichman et al., 2002)
- Results from event level studies among HIV-negative individuals in the U.S. have been mixed (e.g.; Dermen & Cooper, 2000; Fortenberry et al., 1997; Gilmore et al., 2002; Vanable et al., 2004; Weinhardt et al., 2001)

**Notes:**
A more reasonable way to investigate the implied causal association between alcohol use and subsequent unprotected sex is by using an event level approach in which a specific event of drinking prior to sex is paired with an event of unprotected sex occurring that same day. Researchers have used several type of event level studies to investigate the association between alcohol and unprotected sex including paring a single event of unprotected sex with an event alcohol consumption prior to sex, paring multiple events using retrospective recall techniques such as the timeline follow-back interview and daily diary approaches in which participants report on their behaviors every day. This approach has advantages over other multiple event level studies in that it reduces recall errors and biases.

## Psychological Mechanisms 

- Alcohol expectancy theory (Goldman, Del Boca, & Darkes, 1999)
*Sex-Risk Expectancies*
- Alcohol leads to unprotected sex only for individuals who believe that alcohol makes them more likely to have unprotected sex
- Expectancies moderate:
- alcohol-unprotected sex association (e.g, Corbin & Fromme, 2002; Dermen & Cooper, 2000; Dermen et al., 1998)
- alcohol-motivation to use condoms association (Gordon et al., 1997; Maisto et al., 2004)

## Psychological Mechanisms 

- Alcohol myopia (Steele & Josephs, 1990)
- Some behaviors involve an inhibition conflict—both instigatory and inhibitory cues
- Alcohol reduces cognitive processing capability and so instigatory cues (sexual arousal) become more salient than inhibitory cues (evaluations of using condoms)

## Sensation Seeking

- Adventurous and Stimulating Experiences
- Meta-analysis of 53 studies that examine correlates of sexual risk behavior, SS accounts for 64% of observed personality effects on number of partners, first-time partners, frequency unprotected sex
- SS is also robustly associated with alcohol use

- Hoyle et al., 2000

## Implied Causal Association

*Is unprotected sex more likely to occur when alcohol is consumed?*
- Daily diary methods are appropriate to investigate this question

## South African HIV-Positive Sample, Daily Diary StudyMethods

- Participants
- 82 sexually active HIV-positive individuals who drink alcohol (24 men, 58 women), average age 32, Xhosa
- Recruited from HIV Clinics & Support Groups in Cape Town

- SM Kiene,  supported by F31MH072547

## South African HIV-Positive Sample, Daily Diary Study Methods

- Procedures
- Participants were called by an interviewer everyday between 1 – 6 pm for 6-weeks
- The interview consisted of a 6-12 min. duration structured daily diary phone interview
- Adherence to daily protocol
- 3,035 of the possible 3,396 (89.37%) daily interviews were completed

- SM Kiene,  supported by F31MH072547

**Notes:**
Measured the number of sex events (and unprotected sex events) occurring and number of drinks consumed during the daytime (waking up until about 5pm) and evening (from about 5pm until going to sleep)

## Measures 

- Structured Daily Diary
- Daily alcohol consumption (Carney et al., 2000)
- Number of drinks consumed _last night_ and _today_
- 0-15 and 16 or more
- Unprotected sexual behavior (Kiene et al., 2006)
- Number of times had vaginal and anal sex _last night_ and _today_
- Number of times a condom was used during sex _last night_ and _today_
- For each time period: partner type (casual or steady), perceived partner serostatus (positive or negative/unknown), whether alcohol was consumed prior to sex (y/n)

## Measures 

- Baseline Questionnaire
- Sex-risk Related Alcohol Outcome Expectancies (Dermen & Cooper, 1994)
- 6 items sexual disinhibition
*When I’m having sex after I’ve had a few drinks, I can only think of what is going on in the moment*.
- 2 items sexual risk taking
*I am less likely to ask a partner to use a condom after having a few drinks*.
- 1 (*strongly disagree*) to 7 (*strongly agree*) scale
- In the present sample α = .84

## HIV-positive South African Sample

- Among the 82 participants over the 42 days. . .
- Evening
- 3,060 unprotected vaginal sex acts (M=2.01 pp pd, SD=1.23)
- 10,475 drinks consumed (M=6.13 pp pd, SD=3.71)
- Daytime
- 1,007 unprotected vaginal sex acts (M=1.62 pp pd, SD=.93)
- 5,754 drinks consumed (M=4.93 pp pd, SD= 3.73)

- SM Kiene,  supported by F31MH072547

**Notes:**
Approximately half of the unprotected sex acts were with partners who were perceived to be HIV-negative or of unknown HIV serostatus

## Comparison of Global and Event Level Findings

- Data from the 42-days were aggregated
- Those who drank more and drank more frequently had more unprotected sex
- Event-level data
- Consuming alcohol prior to sex and consuming greater quantities of alcohol in this context increased both the proportion of subsequent acts that were unprotected and increased the total number of unprotected sex acts that occurred
- Alcohol outcome expectancies and inhibitory cues moderated these associations under certain circumstances.

## General Discussion

- Public health implications
- Nearly 4,000 unprotected sex occurred among the 82 participants over 42 days,
- 58% of which were with partners perceived to be HIV-negative or HIV-serostatus unknown
- Using average likelihood of infection rates from the Rakai, Uganda Seroconversion Trial (Wawer et al., 2003) suggests that **11 people who were HIV-negative or HIV-status unknown became infected with HIV during the study**
- Need for widespread prevention efforts to help individuals who are living with HIV reduce their sexual risk behavior

##  CONCEPTUAL MODEL

-  CONCEPTUAL MODEL
-                                                                 AGE	     GENDER
- SENSATION SEEKING
-      PREDICTORS OF ALCOHOL USE
-               SOCIETAL/CULTURAL
-        COMMUNITY/NEIGHBORHOOD                       ALCOHOL USE                        ALCOHOL EXPECTANCIES                      UNSAFE SEX
-         INTRAPERSONAL  BEHAVIOR                                                                                  ALCOHOL MYOPIA
- MODERATING FACTORS
-                                                                      • DRINKING ENVIRONMENT
-                                                                               • ECONOMICS
-                                                                               • NON ALCOHOL DRUG RISK
-                                                                               • PARTNER CHARACTERISTICS
-                                                                               • INTERPERSONAL (SEXUAL COERCION)

## Plausible Intervention Strategies

- Cognitive or Motivational Counseling can address expectancies that alcohol enhances sexual outcomes
- Counseling directed at alcohol use reduction, unrelated to sexual risk-taking, may have indirect effects on sex outcomes
- No RCT has shown that reducing alcohol leads to reduced sexual behavior/STI risk

## CLINICAL CONCLUSIONS

- Alcohol Use is common and modifiable
- Alcohol use rarely addressed as part of STI/HIV prevention strategy
- Clinicians need to screen for alcohol problems
- Attention to alcohol in HIV/STI testing sites and Family Planning clinics where focus is usually on a single health issue
- Community-based alcohol interventions (taxes, outlet numbers, campus bans) plus individual sex risk interventions may be most potent