Sexually transmitted infection testing and self-reported diagnoses among a community sample of men who have sex with men, in Scotland

Introduction To examine sexually transmitted infection (STI) testing and self-reported diagnoses among men who have sex with men (MSM), in Scotland. Methods Cross-sectional survey of seven Glasgow gay bars in July 2010 (n=822, 62% response rate); 693 are included in the analyses. Results 81.8% reported ever having had an STI test; 37.4% had tested in the previous 6 months; 13.2% reported having an STI in the previous 12 months. The adjusted odds of having ever tested were significantly higher for men who had 6+ sexual partners in the previous 12 months (adjusted OR=2.66), a maximum sexual health knowledge score (2.23), and had talked to an outreach worker/participated in counselling (1.96), and lower for men reporting any high-risk unprotected anal intercourse (UAI) in the previous 12 months (0.51). Adjusted odds of recent testing were higher for men who had 6+ sexual partners (2.10), talked to an outreach worker/participated in counselling (1.66), maximum sexual health knowledge (1.59), and higher condom use knowledge (1.04), and lower for men aged ≥25 years (0.46). Adjusted odds of having had an STI in the previous 12 months were higher for men who had 6+ sexual partners (3.96) and any high-risk UAI in the previous 12 months (2.24) and lower for men aged ≥25 years (0.57). Conclusions STI testing rates were relatively high, yet still below the minimum recommended for MSM at high risk. Consideration should be given to initiating recall systems for men who test positive for STIs, and to developing behavioural interventions which seek to address STI transmission

Has testing been normalized? An analysis of changes in barriers to HIV testing among men who have sex with men between 2000 and 2010 in Scotland, UK

Objectives: This paper examines changes in barriers to HIV testing amongst gay men. We compared data collected in 2000 and 2010 to assess changes in HIV testing behaviours, in community-level perceptions of barriers to HIV testing, and in the relative contributions of barrier measures. Methods: Cross-sectional surveys were conducted within the commercial gay scene in Glasgow with good response rates (78% and 62%) using a form of time and location sampling. Results: Major changes in HIV testing behaviours were observed between 2000 and 2010 (30.6% increase in testing within previous year). At the community level, the perceived benefits of testing [t (1284) = –8.46; P <0.001] and the norm for HIV testing [t (1236) = –11.62; P < 0.001] increased; however, other perceived barriers did not change (fear of a positive result, clinic-related barriers and attitudes to sex with HIV-positive men). Multinomial logistic regression showed that fear of a positive test result remained a key barrier to HIV testing; however, a significant fear × year of survey interaction indicated that fear played a lesser role in differentiating those who had never been tested from those who had been tested in 2010 than it had in 2000. Conclusions: These findings suggest the partial normalization of HIV testing. While some barriers have reduced, other key barriers remain important. Interventions should be designed and evaluated that attend to both the biomedical and the psychosocial aspects of HIV testing (e.g. the meaning of positive test results, the sexual exclusion of positive men, and HIV-related stigma)

Wireless sensed environment for body area networks

In low power wireless body area networks it is envisaged that there will be communication between on-body devices and wireless nodes placed in the environment (sensed environment) to provide a range of applications including health monitoring. However, there remain major challenges to realise this scenario such as decisions on the optimal node location, node orientation, transmit power level, and the number of nodes to cover the area of interest (sensed environment) which if not correct can lead to poor coverage or over-provisioned, oversized networks. In this paper we experiment with a BAN device and nodes deployed in a variety of locations throughout an office environment to represent a sensed environment. Packet loss rates (PLR) were analysed to explore trade-offs between node densities and transmit power levels. We determine that the deployment location, the density, and BAN transmission power level are important factors to be considered in the scenario where a mobile BAN communicates with a sensed environment. We found that deploying the environment nodes at chest height on the surrounding wall yielded the best results in terms of coverage and node density providing an optimal link between the BAN and the sensed environment

OSPEN: an open source platform for emulating neuromorphic hardware

This paper demonstrates a framework that entails a bottom-up approach to accelerate research, development, and verification of neuro-inspired sensing devices for real-life applications. Previous work in neuromorphic engineering mostly considered application-specific designs which is a strong limitation for researchers to develop novel applications and emulate the true behaviour of neuro-inspired systems. Hence to enable the fully parallel brain-like computations, this paper proposes a methodology where a spiking neuron model was emulated in software and electronic circuits were then implemented and characterized. The proposed approach offers a unique perspective whereby experimental measurements taken from a fabricated device allowing empirical models to be developed. This technique acts as a bridge between the theoretical and practical aspects of neuro-inspired devices. It is shown through software simulations and empirical modelling that the proposed technique is capable of replicating neural dynamics and post-synaptic potentials. Retrospectively, the proposed framework offers a first step towards open-source neuro-inspired hardware for a range of applications such as healthcare, applied machine learning and the internet of things (IoT)

Seeding for pervasively overlapping communities

In some social and biological networks, the majority of nodes belong to multiple communities. It has recently been shown that a number of the algorithms that are designed to detect overlapping communities do not perform well in such highly overlapping settings. Here, we consider one class of these algorithms, those which optimize a local fitness measure, typically by using a greedy heuristic to expand a seed into a community. We perform synthetic benchmarks which indicate that an appropriate seeding strategy becomes increasingly important as the extent of community overlap increases. We find that distinct cliques provide the best seeds. We find further support for this seeding strategy with benchmarks on a Facebook network and the yeast interactome.Comment: 8 Page