Effect of Participative Web-Based Educational Modules on HIV and Sexually Transmitted Infection Prevention Competency...

Area of Science:

• Medical Education
• Public Health
• Infectious Diseases

Background:

• HIV diagnoses disproportionately affect transgender women and men who have sex with men in the US.
• Provider comfort in discussing sexual health and HIV prevention is key to improving care quality.
• Preservice training is vital for establishing early HIV prevention education practices.

Purpose of the Study:

• To develop and evaluate participative web-based educational modules.
• To assess the impact of these modules on future providers' HIV prevention knowledge and awareness.

Main Methods:

• Consultation with sexual health providers, researchers, community professionals, and members to develop 7 web-based modules.
• Piloting modules among medical students, assessing knowledge and comfort via pre- and post-intervention questionnaires.
• Utilizing exploratory factor analysis to analyze questionnaire data.

Main Results:

• 125 and 89 students completed pre- and post-module surveys, respectively.
• Pre-intervention, 99.2% knew about HIV pre-exposure prophylaxis and 92.7% about postexposure prophylaxis.
• Confidence in identifying patients eligible for HIV prophylaxis increased from 30.9% to 91% post-intervention.

Conclusions:

• Medical school curricula require enhanced HIV and STI prevention training for diverse at-risk populations.
• Participative web-based modules are an effective method for teaching HIV prevention concepts.
• Training enables future providers to better identify and care for populations disproportionately affected by HIV.