SYSTEMATIC REVIEW article
Front. Psychiatry
Sec. Addictive Disorders
Volume 16 - 2025 | doi: 10.3389/fpsyt.2025.1494469
This article is part of the Research TopicNeurobiology of substance use disorder, stress-related disorders, and their comorbidityView all 8 articles
Prevalence and epidemiological distribution of substance use among people living with HIV in East African region: meta-analysis
Provisionally accepted
- 1Kampala International University Western Campus, Kampala, Uganda
- 2Bloomberg School of Public Health, Johns Hopkins University, Baltimore, Maryland, United States
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The East African region lacks synthesised scientific-evidence on the impact of different substances used on HIV management and treatment outcomes in this population. We meta-analyzed epidemiological data on substance use among people living with HIV to determine the regional estimate of the prevalence, associated factors and changes over time for each gender, per year or age.The documents were obtained via electronic databases following PRISMA guidelines.The 53 studies of the East Africa region showed a pool estimate proportion of 60.36%, 95%CI (0.5301-0.6728) with an (I 2 =98.88%) by random effect-model, and Q-statistic (df=52)=4662.95, p<0.0001. The publication bias is revealed by funnel plot 55.15% Cl (0.4637-0.6362), linear regression Egger-test indicates z=12.6415, p<0.0001 and the rank correlation test of Kendall's tau=0.1011, p=0.2955. The subgroup analysis showed an estimate of the studymethod of cohort 66.10%, Cl (0.5672-0.7437), I 2 =98.60%, cross-sectional 58.98%, Cl (0.4009-0.7555), I 2 =99.06%. The variables of the subgroup analysis by study-size indicate >1000 samplesize 76.05%, CI (0.4661-0.9203), I 2 =99.75% while <1000 sample-size 62.85%, CI (0.5396-0.7095). The Meta-regression analysis of heterogeneity indicates the covariate of countries (R 2 =0.00%, p<0.0001), types of substance use (R 2 =0.00%, p<0.0001) and study-period (R 2 =16.95%, p=0.0013) significantly moderate the observed heterogeneity.The East Africa region has a high prevalence of substance use among people living with HIV, which may further increase the risk of spread of infections and signs of deteriorating Formatted: Font: Bold physical and mental health. Comprehensive treatment and establishing interventions for substance abuse/misuse among people living with HIV could be a top health priority in the region.
Keywords: Prevalence, Epidemiological-distribution, Substance-use, HIV, East Africa, metaanalysis
Received: 10 Sep 2024; Accepted: 28 Jul 2025.
Copyright: © 2025 ONOHUEAN, Onohuean, Omara and Saleem. This is an open-access article distributed under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution License (CC BY). The use, distribution or reproduction in other forums is permitted, provided the original author(s) or licensor are credited and that the original publication in this journal is cited, in accordance with accepted academic practice. No use, distribution or reproduction is permitted which does not comply with these terms.
* Correspondence: Hope ONOHUEAN, Kampala International University Western Campus, Kampala, Uganda
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