Searching for Effective HIV-Prevention and Care in Sub-Saharan Africa: Focusing on Local Contexts - Home-Based VCT Trial Zambia, 2010

Home-based voluntary HIV counselling and testing (HB-VCT) has been reported to have a high uptake, but it has not been rigorously evaluated. We designed a model for HB-VCT appropriate for wider scale-up, and investigated the acceptance of home-based counselling and testing, equity in uptake and negative life events with a cluster-randomized trial. Thirty six rural clusters in southern Zambia were pair-matched based on baseline data and randomly assigned to the intervention or the control arm. Both arms had access to standard HIV testing services. Adults in the intervention clusters were offered HB-VCT by local lay counsellors. A total of 836 and 858 adults were assigned to the intervention and control clusters, respectively.