Sti Podcast

In this podcast Dr Katy Turner talks to Dr Jane Hocking at the ISSTDR conference in Brisbane, Australia. They discuss Dr Hocking's preliminary results from a Chlamydia screening trial across Australia and the logistics for testing and collecting data across such a large area.

In this podcast Dr Katy Turner talks to PhD student Hayley Denison at the ISSTDR conference in Brisbane. They discuss the differences studying for a PhD in New Zealand compared to the UK and how social media has helped people keep up to date at conferences.

How does drug use feed into STI transmission in men who have sex with men? What kinds of behaviours happen, and how can clinicians discuss these issues with men and best help them? In this podcast Adam Bourne, London School of Hygiene & Tropical Medicine, and David Stuart, substance use lead at the 56 Dean Street sexual health clinic, discuss the issues and offer their advice. Read the related article: Illicit drug use in sexual settings (‘chemsex’) and HIV/STI transmission risk behaviour among gay men in South London: findings from a qualitative study http://goo.gl/u6xubb

Simon Barton, Clinical Director, HIV & Sexual Health, Chelsea & Westminster Hospital, London, talks to Joseph D Tucker, International Diagnostics Centre, Keppel Street, London, about his editorial on how the history of syphilis cures provides some guidance on preparing for a HIV cure. More information about the working group can be found here http://searchiv.web.unc.edu/ Read the full editorial: http://sti.bmj.com/content/91/1/2.full

Nicola Low, Professor of Epidemiology and Public Health at the Institute of Social and Preventive Medicine, University of Bern, Switzerland, talks to Tom Edge, writer of the Channel 4 sitcom Scrotal Recall, a drama where a young man explores his past relationships via contact tracing after discovering he has chlamydia. Tom discusses the medicine and research behind the writing, and the tensions between storytelling and science.

Prevalence studies indicate approximately 10% of patients in HIV clinics may be infected with Neisseria gonorrhoeae (NG) and/or Chlamydia trachomatis (CT) at any given time, and a study recently published in STI by Burchell and colleagues reveals that a modest increase in testing in their clinic did not improve detection of CT and NG. Khalil Ghanem, STI associate editor, asks Stephen Berry, Division of Infectious Diseases, Johns Hopkins University School of Medicine, to comment on the paper and what can be done to improve detection of NG and CT. Read Dr Berry's full editorial: http://goo.gl/ABefHz Read Burchell et al's paper: Modest rise in chlamydia and gonorrhoea testing did not increase case detection in a clinical HIV cohort in Ontario, Canada http://goo.gl/JPsp2e

STI associate editor Katy Turner talks to Kyle Jones, Infection & Population Health, University College London, about his studying examining who in the UK pays for sex.

Jennifer Smith, STI associate editor, talks to Matthew Schabath, H. Lee Moffitt Cancer Center & Research Institute, US, about his paper: Alcohol consumption and prevalence of human papillomavirus infection among US men in the HIM (HPV in Men) Study http://goo.gl/kVaHcm

Dr Clare Tanton, UCL's Centre for Sexual Health and HIV research, and Soazig Clifton, NatCen Social Research, both researchers on The National Survey of Sexual Attitudes and Lifestyles (http://natsal.ac.uk) join us to discuss the survey, how it was carried out, and some of the reaction to their findings. Read the papers online: What's new about Natsal-3: http://goo.gl/IDaRYN Consistency in reporting sensitive sexual behaviours in Britain: http://goo.gl/Zu5qzc Methodology of Natsal-3: http://goo.gl/y85Aw6

Barbara Van Der Pol, Associate Professor of Medicine, University of Alabama at Birmingham, and Dermot Hurly and Monika Buehrer-Skinner, both Anton Breinl Centre for Public Health and Tropical Medicine, James Cook University, have a conversation about issues related to chlamydia point-of-care tests and the need to continually assess the performance of these assays in real-use settings. Read the full paper here: bit.ly/1nizXj5

To go alongside this month's special STI issue on Trichomonas vaginalis, Dr Scott McClelland, Departments of Medicine, Epidemiology, and Global Health, University of Washington, and Prof Sharon Hillier, Department of Obstetrics, Gynecology and Reproductive Sciences, University of Pittsburgh, talk about our current understanding of the condition, and future clinical and academic directions. View all the content from the special issue here: http://sti.bmj.com/content/89/6.toc

Mark Lawton, Mayura Nathan, and David Asboe, the authors of a recent editorial in STI, discuss why they think it's time to include young MSM in the national vaccination programme for HPV. Read the full editorial: http://sti.bmj.com/content/89/5/342.full

Seán Cassidy, doctor in GU medicine at Guys and St Thomas's NHS Foundation Trust, and social media editor for STI, talks to Jonathan Ross, a professor of Sexual Health and HIV based at University Hospitals Birmingham NHS Foundation Trust.

Seán Cassidy, doctor in GU medicine at Guys and St Thomas's NHS Foundation Trust, and social media editor for STI, talks to Katie Turner, a National Institute of Health Research (NIHR) fellow, based in the Department of Social Medicine at the University of Bristol.

Seán Cassidy, doctor in GU medicine at Guys and St Thomas's NHS Foundation Trust, and social media editor for STI, talks to Marita Van De Laar, Head of Program for HIV and Sexually Transmitted and Blood-Borne Infections in the Office of the Chief Scientist of the European Centre for Disease Prevention and Control (EDCD)

Seán Cassidy, doctor in GU medicine at Guys and St Thomas's NHS Foundation Trust, and social media editor for STI, talks to Myron Cohen, Associate Vice Chancellor for Global Health and Director for the Center for Infectious Diseases at the University of North Carolina.

In the UK, it is estimated that 24% of HIV positive patients are unaware of their infection. This figure is derived from statistical modelling, but how often do people who are identified as having been unaware of their infection are actually just non-disclosing instead? In this podcast Gary Brooks talks to Ann Sullivan from Chelsea and Westminster Hospital NHS Foundation Trust, about her research into this phenomenon. Read the full paper online: http://tinyurl.com/bdccuwd

The 2008 UK National Guidelines for HIV testing recommended HIV testing should be offered to all general medical admissions aged 16–60 years in high prevalence areas, and that this should be evaluated to ensure this was effective in diagnosing previously undiagnosed HIV. In this podcast, Gary Brook talks to Adrian Palfreeman, University Hospitals Leicester, about his evaluation in the city.

Katy Turner (NIHR research fellow, School of Social and Community Medicine, Bristol University) talks to Elizabeth Carlin (consultant in Genitourinary Medicine, Nottingham University Hospitals) about the possibilities, limitations and practicalities of using recent infection testing algorithm (RITA) tests to detect HIV. Read the article online: http://tinyurl.com/b3tp9wu

Peter Greenhouse (consultant in sexual health at Bristol Sexual Health Centre and Western) talks to Christopher Carne (consultant in the Department of Genitourinary Medicine, Addenbrookes Hospital, Cambridge University) about his recent case-controlled study looking at semen abnormalities in genitourinary medicine clinic attendees. Read the article online: http://tinyurl.com/bgrvx8e