Addressing intimate partner violence, mental health burdens, and other syndemic factors to support engagement in HIV prevention services in a trans community center

NIH RePORTER · NIH · P30 · $217,256 · view on reporter.nih.gov ↗

Abstract

PROJECT ABSTRACT HIV prevalence is high among transgender and nonbinary (TGNB) individuals in the Ending the HIV Epidemic (EHE) priority jurisdiction of Los Angeles County (LAC). HIV pre-exposure prophylaxis (PrEP) is an evidence-based innovation and part of both the local LAC HIV Prevention Plan and the EHE ‘Prevent’ pillar for individuals with elevated risk for HIV exposure such as TGNB. However, uptake of PrEP remains low among TGNB individuals in LAC, especially among TGNB individuals of color. Low uptake and persistence have been due to multiple syndemic barriers such as intimate partner violence (IPV) and mental health burdens that have been previously identified in multiple studies as well as by our team in LAC. Currently, there is high need to identify and test multilevel implementation strategies to improve and accelerate PrEP uptake and persistence among at-risk TGNB individuals. Our uniquely qualified community-academic collaborative research team proposes to assess the acceptability, feasibility, appropriateness, and preliminary effects of integrating IPV prevention and mental health services into an ongoing gender-affirming PrEP implementation project for TGNB community members. This study will be among the first to integrate strategies for integrating IPV prevention and mental health strategies into an existing PrEP implementation project to increase PrEP uptake and persistence in PrEP services at a Trans Community Center run for the community, by the community. The proposed supplement will leverage the parent study PrEP Well, a multiyear California HIV/AIDS Research Program-funded implementation science grant (CHRP: H21IS3484) to bring comprehensive and gender-affirming PrEP services to scale in a first-of-its-kind transgender community center, TWC. The PrEP Well implementation project has fostered a strong community-academic research collaboration where we will be assessing targeted strategies for integrating mental health and IPV prevention services into the PrEP Well program at TWC. Through our preliminary work conducted during the PrEP Well project with TWC staff, clients, community advisory board members, and other key stakeholders it has become clear that additional implementation strategies for the integration of mental health and IPV prevention with the PrEP Well program is high priority to improve uptake and persistence rates and to help address additional syndemic conditions that are disproportionately impacting TGNB community members.

Key facts

NIH application ID
10818086
Project number
3P30MH058107-27S1
Recipient
UNIVERSITY OF CALIFORNIA LOS ANGELES
Principal Investigator
Steven J Shoptaw
Activity code
P30
Funding institute
NIH
Fiscal year
2023
Award amount
$217,256
Award type
3
Project period
1997-09-30 → 2024-12-31