Protect and Respect for Women Living with HIV/AIDS
(l-r: Rhonda Ferguson, Mary Ann Nkansa, Diane Rorie, Michele Teti)
Faculty Member(s): Marla Gold, MD (PI)
Students/Staff: Michelle Teti '03 (Project Co-ordinator), Susan Rubinstein, Robin Duarte, Rhonda Ferguson, Mary Ann Nkansa, Diane Rorie, Sarabeth Sheffler, Melissa Whipple
Funding Organization(s): SPNS/HRSA; Ryan White Care Act
Description: The Drexel School of Public Health has recently begun an exciting new research project focused on helping women with HIV/AIDS live healthier and safer lives. The intervention project is called “Protect and Respect,” and is made possible through a Special Projects of National Significance (SPNS) grant from the Health Resources and Services Administration (HRSA). This particular SPNS initiative is designed to address the need for interventions serving HIV-positive individuals in clinical care, to prevent transmission to uninfected individuals and to prevent re-infection among people who are already infected. The School of Public Health is one of 15 demonstration sites funded to implement and evaluate prevention interventions with HIV-infected individuals seen in primary care settings.
The project is a collaboration between the Drexel School of Public Health, the Partnership Comprehensive Care Practice (PCCP) and the AIDS Education and Training Center (AETC). Participants are women who receive primary medical care through the PCCP, an academic ambulatory center serving over 1300 adults living with HIV/AIDS in the Philadelphia area. The overall goal of the intervention is to reduce the sexual transmission of HIV by decreasing high-risk behaviors in a cohort of HIV-infected women. 270 women from the clinic will be enrolled into one of two study groups:
- a comparison group that receives HIV prevention messages from their primary care provider, or
- an intervention group that additionally participates in a five-session group-level-intervention designed to teach women various skills to engage in safe sexual behaviors, as well as peer-led support groups designed to support women as they learn new skills.
The intervention is grounded in several different behavioral theories: the AIDS Risk Reduction Model, the Stages of Change Theory, and the Theory of Gender and Power, which take into consideration the multiple personal, social, environmental, and behavioral factors that influence individual behavior. Messages from medical providers are designed to assess a patient’s stage of change, and deliver stage-based counseling messages to support patients in their efforts to make safe sexual decisions. The education and support groups specifically focus on:
- skills to use various contraception methods
- assertive-negotiation skills
- HIV/STD status disclosure skills, and also address gender pride issues, transmission risks and personal risk assessment, triggers to unsafe behavior, processes of change, and healthy relationships.
Results (to date): Data pending