LAUSR

Background Men who have sex with men (MSM) are disproportionally affected by the HIV epidemic. HIV testing coverage among MSM, particularly in low-resource settings, remains low. Self-efficacy is an important individual psychosocial factor associated with access to health care and health outcomes but the association between self-efficacy and HIV testing uptake among key populations is poorly understood. Methods A cross sectional study was conducted with 585 MSM aged 18–24 years recruited by 33 seed respondents from six urban areas in Myanmar via respondent-driven sampling (RDS). RDS analyses were performed to provide population estimates of HIV testing coverage. Sensitivity analysis was performed to assess potential bias due to inclusion of seed and HIV positive respondents on final population estimates. Multinomial logistic regression was use to examine the relationship between self-efficacy and HIV testing uptake. Results More than a third (34.5%) had never been tested for HIV (never tester), 27.5% and 38.0% had their most recent HIV test more than three months (non-recent tester) and within the past three months (recent tester), from the time of interview, respectively. Sensitivity analysis showed similar point estimates excluding seed or HIV positiverespondents (Table1). Results of multinomial logistic regression analyses show that YMSM who reported high self-efficacy (adjusted Relative Risk Ratio [ARR]= 7.35, 95% CI: 2.29–23.5) and moderate self-efficacy (ARR= 8.61, 95% CI: 3.09–24.0) are more likely to report having tested for HIV in the past three months compared to their counterparts who reported low self-efficacy after adjusting for potential confounders. Conclusion HIV testing coverage among YMSM is suboptimal and there is a positive association between self-efficacy and HIV testing uptake among YMSM. Further research is needed to examine the direction of this association to inform future public health interventions targeting YMSM in Myanmar. Disclosure No significant relationships.