Examining how men make decisions about human immunodeficiency virus (HIV) services and what service configurations they value most

The study used a mixed-methods design, combining scoping reviews that mapped existing evidence on men's HIV service engagement across sub-Saharan Africa, qualitative fieldwork that explored the lived experiences, barriers, and motivations shaping men's health-seeking behavior, discrete choice experiments (DCEs) that quantified which service attributes (e.g., location, hours, provider type, confidentiality, testing modality) men valued most when deciding whether to access HIV services, and latent class analysis that identified distinct subgroups of men with different preference patterns, rather than treating "men" as a homogeneous group. The work was situated within an implementation science framework, aiming to translate preference data into actionable recommendations for designing more male-friendly, differentiated HIV service delivery models directly relevant to South Africa's ongoing challenge of low male uptake of testing and treatment compared to women. Ultimately, the research sought to inform policy and programming that better aligned HIV service design with what men actually wanted and needed, with the potential to improve testing rates, linkage to care, and retention among South African men.