(P187-LB) Co-Designing a multi-level intervention to engage Black cisgender women in HIV prevention and PrEP awareness

Project: Strategies for the project included a multi-step process. Step one included developing and implementing an educational session for salon stylists with primarily Black women customers on basic HIV knowledge and facts as well as biomedical prevention of HIV with PrEP. Stylists were also certified as opinion leaders. Opinion leader training prepares well respected community members to share knowledge and promote healthy social norms in their communities. The second step of the project included recruiting Black women customers from the salon to view a culturally relevant, scripted, 4-episode mini-series geared towards Black women’s health issues, including HIV and PrEP. Women participants were also provided information and access to a PrEP navigator.    

Issue: Black women in the United States are disproportionally impacted by HIV. Marketing and community interventions for biomedical prevention of HIV have largely targeted men who have sex with men, leaving Black women to feel that PrEP is not an option. Therefore, a HIV prevention/PrEP awareness project was co-developed with the community.  

Results: 105 participants were recruited and 72 (69%) women completed the pretest survey with 44 (42%) completing the posttest survey. Women who completed all pretest and posttest measures (n = 44) were included in the analysis. Quantitative measures were used in a pre-posttest design to examine PrEP knowledge, awareness, risk, stigma, trust, and intentions. No participants contacted the PrEP navigator. 

Lessons Learned: The intervention improved knowledge and awareness and trust around PrEP among Black cisgender women. PrEP use stigma within interpersonal relationships decreased but low perceived risk and social stigma remained constant. Future interventions should culturally address risk perception. Increased approval of PrEP use from close relationships – including intimate partner, family, and friends – is encouraging as these relationships can impact a woman’s PrEP use and speaks to effective portrayals of relationships within the intervention’s content. Use of telehealth may be more effective than a PrEP navigator for Black cis-gender women. Black women and their stylists were engaged throughout the development of the project. Intentional inclusion of the community of interest in designing interventions is critical to success and sustainability.