This Article  • Full text  • PDF  • Send to a friend  • Save in My Folder  • Save to citation manager  • Permissions  Citing Articles  • Contact me when this article is cited  Related Content  • Similar articles in JAMA

Joan Stephenson, PhD

JAMA. 2001;286:159.

	Since this article does not have an abstract, we have provided the first 150 words of the full text and any section headings.

British researchers evaluating an educational effort to reduce risky sexual behavior in gay men unexpectedly found that men who participated in a safe sex workshop were more likely to acquire a new sexually transmitted disease (STD) during the 12-month follow-up than were men in the control group.

In the study, published in the June 16 issue of BMJ, 343 gay men who had an acute non-HIV STD or who reported recent unprotected anal intercourse had a 20-minute private counseling session on safer sex practices. About half the men (the intervention group) also took part in a 1-day workshop.

Unexpectedly, a larger proportion of men in the intervention group (31%) had at least one sexually transmitted infection in the follow-up year compared with 21% of men in the control group. "Even carefully formulated behavioural interventions should not be assumed to bring benefit," the researchers noted, adding that . . . [Full Text of this Article]