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To end the HIV epidemic in the US among gay, bisexual and other men who have sex with men (MSM), we must bring to scale evidence-based prevention interventions (EBIs) for minoritized urban Black and Latinx MSM. In support of this goal, we conducted a demonstration implementation research project in support of the CDC Ending the HIV Epidemic (EHE) initiative (Jones et al., 2022) to ‘crowdsource’ innovation for public health prevention impact. Our approach integrated advanced health communications research methods and entrepreneurial methods, with the aim of building multi-sectoral partnerships to accelerate the pace of discovery of strategies that improve and sustain EBI reach. To identify multi-level factors that are critical to effective provider-patient communications, we first leveraged data from an ongoing online cohort study of MSM of color and from an on-going intervention planning study to inform several stigma-reducing message frames (Grov et al., 2020; Frye et al., 2017, 2019, 2020). With insights derived from these analyses, we applied crowdsourcing techniques to organize diverse, interdisciplinary individuals into teams of designers and collaborators who were invited to participate in a virtually facilitated, day-long ‘designathon.’ The goals of our designathon were to promote rapid ideation of prototype concepts that foster uptake of PrEP and to select the most promising communications strategies and tools for subsequent intervention design and development. Designathon participants (N=35) included early-stage innovators (n=10) and collaborators with various talents, expertise, priorities and opinions (n=25). Six novel technology-enabled communications solutions were presented and vetted during the designathon. These solutions embroidered upon evidence-based practices in patient navigation, routine HIV testing, and provider-patient communications. A post-hoc, qualitative critique of concepts was informed by PRISM (Practical, Robust Implementation and Sustainability Model; Feldstein and Glasgow, 2008), correlates of acceptability (preferences, perceived barriers/benefits, willingness to use/recommend; Orblad et al., 2022), and tenets of environmental health (goodness of socio-cultural fit for urban MSM of color, efficiency in health care delivery [waste-minimizing, resource-conserving]).
Presented by:
David W. Lounsbury, PhD
Associate Professor of Epidemiology and Population Health and Associate Director of Patient-Centered Outcomes Research Training at the Albert Einstein College of Medicine, Bronx, New York
Project team: Terry Huang, PhD, MPH, MBA (Site-PI, CUNY School of Public Health); Victoria Frye, MPH, DrPH (Site-PI, CUNY City College [now Columbia University, School of Social Work]); Alessandro Ciari, Asst Dir, CUNY Center for Sys & Comm Design; DeShawn Usher, Director, MOBI (Co-I/Consultant, MOBI); Nasim Sabounchi, PhD (Co-I, CUNY School of Public Health); Christian Grov, PhD (Co-I/Consultant, CUNY School of Public Health); Viraj Patel, MD, MPH (Co-I/Consultant, Einstein College of Medicine); Oni Blackstock, MD, MHS (Consultant, Executive Director at Health Justice); and Stella Safo, MD (Consultant, Mt. Sinai Medical Center).