HIV-PrEP (pre-exposure prophylaxis) is a medication that can help stop people from getting HIV if they ever come in contact with it. HIV-PEP (post-exposure prophylaxis) protects people from getting HIV after they have been exposed. Both HIV-PrEP and HIV-PEP protect against HIV but what if we want to protect against bacterial sexually transmitted infections (STIs) like gonorrhea, chlamydia, and syphilis? That’s where Doxy-PEP comes in!

Doctors have recently found that a commonly used antibiotic called doxycycline can lower your chances of getting an STI. Doxycycline for post-exposure prophylaxis, or Doxy-PEP, requires you to take two pills of doxycycline within 72 hours of any condomless sexual activity.

While this antibiotic has been used for years for treatment, using it in this way In order to further our understanding of Doxy-PEP, we have launched the Doxy4STICare study.

The prevalence of STIs is rising globally and is a significant public health problem. Doxycycline has been proven to reduce bacterial STIs in gay, bisexual, and other men who have sex with men, which is excellent news!

However, this is a new intervention and there are a lot of things that we need to better understand about this promising intervention. Some major things include:

· How often do you need to have visits when you are taking Doxy-PEP?

· Do you need to use Doxy-PEP for every sexual encounter?

· Is use of Doxy-PEP going to affect the bacteria that lives in my body?

· Will we be contributing to creating bacterial resistance?

With that in mind, we want to look at how people are engaging in care, how and when they take their Doxy-PEP (if you’re taking it), and how Doxy-PEP might impact bacteria and their resistance for people taking Doxy-PEP and their sexual partners.

If you receive a partner referral card from someone participating in the study, scan the QR code or go to the website on the card. If you are interested in participating, or at least learning more about the study, fill out your contact information and provide the unique code that is on your card. One of our staff members will reach out to answer any questions you may have and schedule an in-office visit if you choose to do so. Please keep in mind that just because someone referred you, it doesn’t mean you HAVE to participate. You should be making your own decision. Also, submitting a contact form to chat with us to learn more about the study does not mean you have to participate, either.

During this one-time visit, we will review the study in detail to make sure you want to participate. If you do, we will ask you to complete a few questionnaires and provide some samples, including rectal, throat, and nasal swabs, a urine sample, and one tube of blood. And that’s it! No follow-up required.

The study has three parts to it: a questionnaire portion, a sample collection portion, and a partner referral portion.

1. The questionnaire portion will have you answering an enrollment questionnaire that’s all about you, including prevention practices you may use and thoughts and attitudes that you might have towards different prevention methods. After that, we ask that you complete a brief weekly survey that checks-in with you regarding sexual practices from that week and if you took Doxy-PEP during that time.

2. The sample portion will ask that you provide a few samples at your regular clinic visit. We would be collecting the same sorts of swabs you might collect at a routine check-up (rectal swabs, throat swabs, and nasal swabs). We’ll also collect any leftover urine samples from when you provide it to your clinician, and we’ll add one extra tube of blood to those you’re already having collected. As the study progresses, we’ll ask if you would like to provide samples each time you come in for a regular clinic visit.

3. The partner referral portion will ask you to refer any sexual partners you feel comfortable recommending to us! This is totally optional, but we encourage you to do so because it helps us learn a little more about the how bacteria may transmit between sexual partners. If your partner does want to participate, we would schedule a one-time visit with them where they would answer questionnaires very similar to yours and provide the same sort of samples that you provided.

We are looking for folks who meet the following criteria:

· At least 18 years old

· Assigned male at birth

· Capable of providing informed consent

· Owner of a smartphone that can accept text messages and where you can complete online questionnaires, and

· Engaged in care at the Comprehensive Health Program at Columbia University Irving Medical Center.

· You do not need to be taking Doxy-PEP to participate.

If you would like to participate as a partner, you must meet the following criteria:

· At least 18 years old

· Assigned male at birth

· You do not need to be taking Doxy-PEP to participate.