Promoting sexually transmitted infection (STI) prophylaxis and community resource sharing in medical student-run clinics

Student-run clinics are an important component of many medical school extracurricular offerings. Patients accessing these free clinics are often uninsured and experience higher rates of sexually transmitted infections (STIs).1 Medical student competence in discussing STI prophylaxis is paramount for promoting prevention. We sought to determine if a brief lecture would increase first year medical students’ comfort with counselling patients on STI prevention.

A 30-minute lecture reviewing STI screening, prophylaxis and community resources was created by students and reviewed by a faculty physician. Pre-lecture and post-lecture questionnaires assessed comfort in discussing each of the aforementioned domains.

Seventy-five students (n=75/92 respondents, 81.5%) completed questionnaires, with 33 (44%) citing previous exposure to sexual health education. Both groups had increased comfort scores following the presentation (table 1). Lectures on STI prophylaxis may be an important intervention to promote effective STI counselling within student-run clinics.

Table 1

Mean confidence scores across students with…

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