Table 1.

Description of the seven studies that met eligibility criteria for inclusion in the review and meta-analysis.

Author/Year	Country and study period	Study design	Sample and sample size	Intervention	Comparison	Outcome measures	Main finding	Months of follow-up
Elford 2001	London, UK; 1997–1999	RCT	n=1000 gay men	Peers recruited gay men from a gym	Gym with no peer educators	Condomless anal intercourse and ever tested for HIV	% of men ever-tested for HIV increased from 73.0% at baseline to 79.6 % follow-up (p=0.002)	18
Golden 2006	King County, Washington State, US; 2002–2004	Pre/post	n=781 MSM	Peers were trained and provided with incentives to refer MSM to care for HIV testing	No comparison	New cases of HIV	Intervention group were not more likely to have been previously tested for HIV at follow up compared with baseline (83% vs 89%, p=0.37)	Unspecified
Erausquin 2009	Los Angeles, California, US; 2003–2004	Pre/post	n=95 young Latino MSM	Trained outreach volunteers that shared characteristics with the target population distributed bilingual outreach cards to encourage young Latino MSM to test for HIV	No comparison	HIV testing and self-reported sexual risk behaviors	At post-intervention, there was more HIV testing among young Latino MSM participants compared to baseline	12
Wilton 2009	New York, US; 2005–2006	Quasi-randomized trial	338 African American MSM, 18 years and older, residing in New York. Randomly assigned to intervention (n=164) or comparison (n=174).	3MV, a small group intervention to address factors influencing the HIV/STI risk and protective behaviors. 6 sessions lasting 2–3 hours. Two trained Black MSM peers co-facilitated the sessions	Assigned to delayed 3MV comparison (wait list)	Sexual risk behaviors, and HIV and STI testing	At the 6-month follow-up 3MV participants (intervention group) had an 81% greater odds of testing for HIV than comparison participants (OR; 1.81, 95% CI 1.08–3.01)	6
Geibel 2012	Coastal Kenya; 2002–2009	Pre/post	n=1026 male sex workers	40 peer educators (male sex workers or non-sex worker MSM familiar with the sex worker environment) were trained in HIV prevention.	No comparison	HIV knowledge and condomless sexual behavior	Intervention group were more likely to have ever been tested for HIV (87.2% vs 60.9%), aOR: 4.37, 95% CI 2.04–9.36	12
Ko 2013	Taiwan; Apr–Sep 2011	Quasi-randomized trial	Internet-using MSM, aged 18 years and older, who had sex with a man in the past 12 months. Intervention group n=1037 and control group n=485	iPOL trained for 12 weeks to disseminate HIV-related information on HIV prevention, strategies for risk reduction, and behavior change. Information was disseminated via the Internet	Website created but no iPOL	HIV testing behavior, risky behaviors	At 6 months follow-up, MSM receiving iPOL interventions were more likely to have tested for HIV (43.9% vs 22.3%, p<0.001)	6
Young 2015	Peru; Jan–Dec 2012	Cluster randomized trial	n=1112 males, ages 18 years or older, who had sex with a man in the past 12 months, HIV negative or serostatus unknown. n=556 assigned to either intervention or control (1:1 ratio)	Peer leaders attended three 3-hour training sessions and each was assigned a Facebook group to train and mentor MSM. Main topic for discussion was HIV prevention and testing	Standard of care, including standard offline HIV prevention available in Peru and participation in Facebook groups (without peer leaders) that provided study updates and HIV testing information	Primary outcome: proportion that received free HIV test at a local community clinic. Secondary outcome: number of requests for HIV testing	43 participants (17%) in the intervention group and 16 (7%) in the control groups got tested for HIV (aOR: 2.61, 95% CI 1.55–4.38). Odds of requesting a test were 2.79 times higher (95% CI 1.42–5.72) among participants in the intervention group	12

Notes: RCT= randomized controlled trial; 3MV=Many men, Many voices; vs=versus; aOR= Adjusted odds ratio; iPOL=Internet popular opinion leader