-
- Jessica L Webster, Lorna E Thorpe, Dustin T Duncan, and Neal D Goldstein.
- Department of Epidemiology and Biostatistics, Drexel University Dornsife School of Public Health, Philadelphia, Pennsylvania.
- Am J Prev Med. 2022 Dec 1; 63 (6): 105310611053-1061.
IntroductionAs the first step in the HIV care continuum, timely diagnosis is central to reducing transmission of the virus and ending the HIV epidemic. Studies have shown that distance from a testing site is essential for ease of access to services and educational material. This study shows how location-allocation analysis can be used to improve allocation of HIV testing services utilizing existing publicly available data from 2015 to 2019 on HIV prevalence, testing site location, and factors related to HIV in Philadelphia, Pennsylvania.MethodsThe ArcGIS Location-Allocation analytic tool was used to calculate locations for HIV testing sites using a method that minimizes the distance between demand-point locations and service facilities. ZIP code level demand was initially specified on the basis of the percentage of late HIV diagnoses and in a sensitivity analysis on the basis of a composite of multiple factors. Travel time and distance from demand to facilities determined the facility location allocation. This analysis was conducted from 2021 to 2022.ResultsCompared with the 37 facilities located in 20 (43%) Philadelphia ZIP codes, the model proposed reallocating testing facilities to 37 (79%) ZIP codes using percent late diagnoses to define demand. On average, this would reduce distance to the facilities by 65% and travel time to the facilities by 56%. Results using the sensitivity analysis were similar.ConclusionsA wider distribution of HIV testing services across the city of Philadelphia may reduce distance and travel time to facilities, improve accessibility of testing, and in turn increase the percentage of people with knowledge of their status.Copyright © 2022 American Journal of Preventive Medicine. Published by Elsevier Inc. All rights reserved.
Notes
Knowledge, pearl, summary or comment to share?You can also include formatting, links, images and footnotes in your notes
- Simple formatting can be added to notes, such as
*italics*
,_underline_
or**bold**
. - Superscript can be denoted by
<sup>text</sup>
and subscript<sub>text</sub>
. - Numbered or bulleted lists can be created using either numbered lines
1. 2. 3.
, hyphens-
or asterisks*
. - Links can be included with:
[my link to pubmed](http://pubmed.com)
- Images can be included with:
![alt text](https://bestmedicaljournal.com/study_graph.jpg "Image Title Text")
- For footnotes use
[^1](This is a footnote.)
inline. - Or use an inline reference
[^1]
to refer to a longer footnote elseweher in the document[^1]: This is a long footnote.
.