Attitudes to taking a sexual history in general practice in Victoria, Australia

Objective: To examine general practitioners' (GPs') attitudes towards takin g a sexual history. Methods: Questions on sexual history taking were included in a random surve y on the STD knowledge, attitudes, and practices of 600 GPs practising in V ictoria, Australia. Results: Most GPs commonly asked patients about safe sex (79%), number of s ex partners (63%), and injecting drug use (60%) while fewer asked about rec ent overseas travel (50%) and sex with sex workers (31%). GPs who performed sexual health consultations daily or weekly identified barriers to sexual history taking to be of less concern than those who performed such consulta tions infrequently. Most GPs (92%) would take a sexual history from a man p resenting as the sexual contact of an infected partner, but less than a thi rd would do so for a patient routinely requesting the contraceptive pill (2 8%), a Papanicolaou (Pap) smear (30%), or advice about immunisation before overseas travel (30%). Female GPs were significantly more likely than male GPs to take a sexual history in those clinical situations involving a femal e patient and also to perceive these patients as experiencing less embarras sment. Conclusions: This study highlights both the lack of opportunistic sexual hi story taking and the main barriers to sexual history taking in general prac tice in Victoria, Australia. The importance of educating both patients and GPs about sexual history taking are discussed.