Socio-demographic, clinical and health facility-related predictors of delayed HIV diagnosis among patients newly diagnosed with HIV in Northwest Ethiopia: a multilevel analysis

Abstract Background Ethiopia recently implemented the ‘test and treat’ strategy for all HIV-infected individuals receiving a diagnosis at the health facility level. However, the impact of this policy in terms of timely HIV diagnosis and factors associated with it were not evaluated. Therefore, this study aimed to determine the magnitude and predictors of delayed HIV diagnosis among newly diagnosed people living with HIV in the northwest, Ethiopia. Methods In this cross-sectional study, a total of 759 newly diagnosed patients were recruited consecutively. The multistage sampling technique was employed to select health facilities and all newly diagnosed patients were included. Delayed HIV diagnosis was defined when there is an established AIDS-defining clinical condition (WHO clinical stage III or IV), irrespective of CD4 count. Data were entered into Epi-Data version 3.5 and exported to STATA version 14 for further analysis. Taking into account the nested structure of the data, multilevel logistic regression analysis has been employed. Four models containing variables of interest were fitted. Multivariate multilevel logistic regression analysis was performed to estimate the adjusted odds ratios (AOR) at a 95% confidence interval (CI). Results A one-fourth of newly diagnosed HIV patients diagnosed at advanced disease stage. After controlling for other individual and health facility level factors, factors associated with delayed HIV diagnosis were: Patients who had completed secondary school or higher (AOR = 2.08, 95% CI = 1.06, 4.08), patients who presented to health facilities with HIV symptoms (AOR = 5.87, 95% CI = 3.57, 9.62), being non-working functional status (AOR = 4.80, 95% CI = 2.58, 8.92) and HIV diagnosis at hospitals (AOR = 2.16, 95% CI = 1.08, 4.31). Conclusion The magnitude of delayed HIV diagnosis was improved. In addition to individual-level factors, it is important to address health facility-related factors to improve earlier HIV diagnosis. Here, we recommend using both clinical and laboratory characteristics of a patient particularly, baseline CD4 count and viral load to identify patients diagnosed with advanced disease stage. Moreover, public health interventions are important targeted on factors associated with delayed HIV diagnosis.