Perspectives and Current Practices in the Provision of Sexual Health Support for People with CKD: A Survey of Canadian Health Care Providers
Bibliographic record
Abstract
Background: People living with chronic kidney disease (CKD) have identified sexual health as an important aspect of their wellbeing and kidney care. However, limited information is available to integrate sexual health support within multidisciplinary CKD care. We aimed to explore the perceptions, practices, and needs of healthcare providers in Canadian multidisciplinary CKD clinics related to sexual health support for individuals with non-dialysis CKD. Methods: We administered an online survey to healthcare providers (i.e., nephrologists, nurses, allied health professionals) from multidisciplinary CKD clinics across Canada. The survey included questions related to providers’ understanding of sexual health, current practices, and perceived gaps in how patients’ sexual health is addressed in routine CKD care. We conducted semi-structured interviews with interested respondents to expand on survey responses. Data were analyzed descriptively for the survey and using content analysis for the qualitative data. Results: Thirty nurses, 23 nephrologists, 8 allied health professionals, 5 managers, and 5 other team members (e.g., unit clerk) completed the survey between September and December 2023. Participants most commonly defined sexual health as physical symptoms related to sexual function, prevention of sexually transmitted infections, and pregnancy and fertility care. Most respondents reported not having any formal training in the area (80%) and having discussed sexual health with less than one quarter of their patients (71%). While respondents reported that sexual health was most often discussed when patients introduced the topic (39%), they indicated that less than one quarter of patients raised concerns during clinic visits (89%). Qualitative findings complemented survey results and elaborated on key barriers to integrating sexual health into routine care, including lack of knowledge, inadequate training, and time constraints. Conclusion: We identified variability in sexual health definitions and care practices among healthcare providers from multidisciplinary CKD clinics. Identified barriers will inform strategies to enhance sexual health supports for individuals with CKD.
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How this classification was reachedexpand
Full frame machine prediction
Teacher imitationNot calibrated prevalence, not ground truth. Human validation pending. The Gemma side is a direct model label for every work in the frame, read from the title-only record. The Codex side is a classifier learned from the 10,348 direct Codex labels and calibrated to design-weighted sample rates; fields without enough sample support carry no Codex call. Candidate is the union of the two sides; consensus is their intersection. These outputs are machine_predicted_unvalidated and are not human labels.
Distilled classifier scores by category (both heads)
| Category | Codex | Gemma |
|---|---|---|
| Metaresearch | 0.003 | 0.008 |
| Meta-epidemiology (narrow) | 0.000 | 0.000 |
| Meta-epidemiology (broad) | 0.000 | 0.000 |
| Bibliometrics | 0.001 | 0.003 |
| Science and technology studies | 0.006 | 0.001 |
| Scholarly communication | 0.002 | 0.001 |
| Open science | 0.001 | 0.002 |
| Research integrity | 0.001 | 0.001 |
| Insufficient payload (model declined to judge) | 0.002 | 0.000 |
Machine scores (provisional)
The two teacher heads of the student model, read on this work. A score orders the frame for review; it never asserts a category, and the validation status ships verbatim with every row.
Baseline scores from an immature model (maturity gate not passed, 7 training rounds). Scores rank; they never assert a category.
score_only:v0-immature-baseline · verbatim from the scoring run: score_only means the number may rank works, and no category label ships from itClassification
machine, unvalidatedMachine predicted; a candidate call from one source (direct Gemma or distilled Codex), not a consensus.
How this classification was reached, model by model and score by score, is at the end of the page under "How this classification was reached".