School of Public Health, Faculty of Medicine, The University of Queensland, Brisbane, QLD 4006, Australia.
Metro North Public Health Unit, Metro North Hospital and Health Service, Brisbane, QLD 4053, Australia.
J Travel Med. 2024 Jun 3;31(4). doi: 10.1093/jtm/taae024.
Casual sex during travel is a major preventable factor in the global transmission of sexually transmissible infections (STI). Pre-travel consults present an excellent opportunity for practitioners to educate travellers about sexual and reproductive health (SRH) and safety. This scoping review aims to explore and understand the extent to which SRH is included in pre-travel consultations.
PubMed, Embase, Cumulative Index to Nursing and Allied Health Literature, Scopus, Medline and Web of Science were systematically searched for primary research articles exploring whether health care practitioners (HCP) included SRH in pre-travel consultations. Extracted findings were synthesized and presented in narrative form.
Findings across 13 articles suggest HCPs infrequently broached SRH in pre-travel consultations with HCP discomfort, and lack of time and resources presented as key barriers. Urban practice settings, HCP experience, training in travel medicine and traveller characteristics such as sexual orientation were positively associated with discussions about SRH. SRH advice reported was general in nature, primarily focusing on safer sex, condoms or unspecified STI advice. Risk assessments based solely on age or stereotypes around sexual preferences led to key aspects of SRH care being missed for some (e.g. SRH was less likely to be discussed with older travellers).
HCPs frequently miss opportunities to integrate SRH into pre-travel consultations. Strategies to promote HCP confidence and awareness present a promising means to boost the frequency and quality of SRH advice disseminated. Integrating culturally safe and responsive SRH history-taking and advice into pre-travel consultations may contribute to global reductions in STI transmission and promote traveller SRH well-being.
旅行中的随意性行为是全球性传播感染（STI）传播的一个主要可预防因素。旅行前咨询为医生提供了一个极好的机会，可以向旅行者传授性健康和生殖健康（SRH）和安全性知识。本范围审查旨在探讨和了解在多大程度上将 SRH 纳入旅行前咨询中。
系统地检索了 PubMed、Embase、Cumulative Index to Nursing and Allied Health Literature、Scopus、Medline 和 Web of Science 中的原始研究文章，以探讨医疗保健提供者（HCP）是否在旅行前咨询中包括 SRH。提取的发现以叙述形式综合呈现。
13 篇文章的结果表明，HCP 在旅行前咨询中很少涉及 SRH，HCP 的不适、缺乏时间和资源是主要障碍。城市实践环境、HCP 经验、旅行医学培训以及旅行者的特征（如性取向）与有关 SRH 的讨论呈正相关。报告的 SRH 建议性质普遍，主要集中在安全性行为、避孕套或未指定的 STI 建议上。仅基于年龄或对性偏好的刻板印象进行风险评估，导致某些方面的 SRH 护理被忽视（例如，不太可能与年长的旅行者讨论 SRH）。
HCP 经常错过将 SRH 纳入旅行前咨询的机会。促进 HCP 信心和意识的策略是提高 SRH 建议传播的频率和质量的有前途的手段。将文化安全和响应的 SRH 病史采集和建议纳入旅行前咨询可能有助于减少全球 STI 传播，并促进旅行者的 SRH 健康。
