Lightfoot Marguerita, Jackson-Morgan Joi, Pollack Lance, Bennett Ayanna
Division of Prevention Science, Department of Medicine, University of California San Francisco, San Francisco, CA, United States.
3rd Street Youth Center and Clinic, San Francisco, CA, United States.
JMIR Form Res. 2022 Jun 9;6(6):e32416. doi: 10.2196/32416.
BACKGROUND: Adolescents are disproportionately affected by sexually transmitted infections (STIs), including HIV. Many youths with asymptomatic STI or related symptoms do not seek treatment and may not be screened if accessing the health care system for other reasons. OBJECTIVE: We examined intervention completion and changes in the number of new patients, the number of STI or HIV tests, and the sexual risk profile of patients over time to determine the feasibility and acceptability of a peer-driven text messaging strategy to connect youth to STI and HIV services. METHODS: The intervention enlisted consecutive patients at an adolescent medicine clinic to send a text message to 5 peers they believed were sexually active and lived in the clinic's service area. The intervention was evaluated using an interrupted time-series design in which baseline clinic service levels were documented during a 35-week lead-in period, followed by a 20-week intervention implementation period, and a 16-week period of continued clinic observation. Clinic and patient data were obtained through chart abstraction from intake forms that occurred during the entire study period. Analyses conducted in 2015 used a generalized linear mixed model. RESULTS: Of the 153 patients approached to participate, 100 agreed to send SMS text messages. Most (n=55, 55%) reported no concerns with sending the text message. No adverse events or negative outcomes were reported. Adolescent STI testing, positive test results, and reported risk behavior increased post intervention, although this was not statistically significant, likely because of the small sample size. CONCLUSIONS: Given low youth uptake of health care services, and STI/HIV screening, in particular, new strategies are needed to address access barriers. Common approaches for reaching youth are resource-intensive and often miss those not connected to school or community programs. The peer-based text messaging strategy showed promise for both increasing the number of youths accessing health services and finding youths engaging in sexual risk behaviors and most in need of sexual health screening and services.
背景:青少年受性传播感染(包括艾滋病毒)的影响尤为严重。许多患有无症状性传播感染或相关症状的年轻人不寻求治疗,并且如果因其他原因进入医疗保健系统,可能不会接受筛查。 目的:我们研究了干预措施的完成情况以及新患者数量、性传播感染或艾滋病毒检测数量以及患者性风险状况随时间的变化,以确定由同伴推动的短信策略将年轻人与性传播感染和艾滋病毒服务联系起来的可行性和可接受性。 方法:该干预措施招募了青少年医学诊所的连续患者,让他们向5名他们认为有性行为且居住在诊所服务区的同伴发送短信。采用中断时间序列设计对干预措施进行评估,在35周的导入期记录基线诊所服务水平,随后是20周的干预实施期,以及16周的诊所持续观察期。通过从整个研究期间的 intake 表格中提取图表来获取诊所和患者数据。2015年进行的分析使用了广义线性混合模型。 结果:在邀请参与的153名患者中,100名同意发送短信。大多数(n = 55,55%)表示发送短信没有顾虑。未报告不良事件或负面结果。干预后青少年性传播感染检测、阳性检测结果以及报告的风险行为有所增加,尽管这在统计学上不显著,可能是因为样本量较小。 结论:鉴于年轻人对医疗保健服务的利用率较低,尤其是性传播感染/艾滋病毒筛查,需要新的策略来解决获取障碍问题。接触年轻人的常见方法资源密集型,并且常常遗漏那些未与学校或社区项目有联系的人。基于同伴的短信策略在增加获得医疗服务的年轻人数量以及发现有性风险行为且最需要性健康筛查和服务的年轻人方面显示出了前景。
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