Promoting resilience through neurocognitive functioning in youth living with HIV

Using a phased model of intervention development, we developed an intervention to promote resilience in youth living with HIV via improved neurocognitive resources. First, youth completed a naturalistic prospective memory (PM) task and were randomized into a visualization condition or control condition. Next, 47 of these participants completed another naturalistic PM task and were randomized into Calendaring condition, an Alarm condition, a Combined condition, or a Control condition. Youth with low PM demonstrated observable gains from the visualization technique. Youth in the Combined Calendaring and Alarm condition demonstrated significantly better performance than participants in the Control and Calendaring conditions. In a Proof-of-Concept study with 16 youth, the previous findings were translated into a single session in-person intervention followed by tailored text messaging to improve adherence and viral load via improved neurocognitive resources. The resulting intervention showed a signal of effect with viral load reductions in youth with available data. Targeting compensatory strategies to enhance neurocognitive functioning may promote resilience and health outcomes. A randomized pilot study with a control condition is the next step.