Relationship counseling encourages couples HIV testing

It’s long been known that couples HIV testing and counseling is an effective way to mutually disclose HIV status and link to health care–unfortunately, couples don’t use it even though it’s widely available.

Lynae Darbes, associate professor in the School of Nursing at the University of Michigan, wanted to change that, so she and her team developed an intervention designed to improve the likelihood that couples will decide to engage in HIV testing together.

The intervention, called Uthando Lwethu –“our love” in Zulu–took place in a rural area of South Africa in a province with the highest prevalence of HIV in the country. It worked, and of the 334 couples enrolled in their study, 42 percent of the experimental group chose to participate in couples HIV testing, compared to 12 percent of couples in the control group.  Read More