(P334) Online testing over samples population groups with the greatest STI risk

Background. Online services provide home sampling for Chlamydia, Gonorrhoea, Trichomonas, HIV, Syphilis, Hepatitis B&C and they have been shown to improve access to testing. In the UK, Sexually Transmitted Infections (STIs) are disproportionally higher in young people, Black and Minority Ethnic, Men who have Sex with Men (MSM) and communities of relative poverty; however, it is not known whether these ‘at risk’ groups engage with online services. We therefore investigated how the demographics of online users compared to the local population.

Methods. The demographics of clients who completed online STI orders between April 4th, 2021, to March 21, 2022, were obtained from the company serving a county in Southeast England with a population of 1,589,100 in 2020. The proportion of online clients by each demographic were compared with the proportions of the county provided by the Office of National Statistics. The Index of Multiple Deprivation (IMD) is an aggregate score of seven domains that include income, employment, education, health, crime, barriers to housing & services and the living environment.

Results. All the results, summarised in the table, show the number of orders by demographic category, their proportion, the known demographic proportion for the county and the difference. Online testing clients were more likely to be younger, Black African, and the lowest deciles of deprivation. Men were significantly under sampled; however, of the men who tested, 21% were MSM.

Conclusion. Online testing in this analysis has demonstrated an over-representation by those very groups with the greatest STI risk. Additional work is required to repeat this analysis across other counties and metropolitan areas in England.