Disease in the News

Critical Appraisal of

Hey Girlfriend : An Evaluation of AIDS Prevention

Among Women in the Sex Industry

Name

University of

Faculty Name

March 5 , 2008

Critical Appraisal of Hey Girlfriend : An Evaluation of AIDS Prevention

among Women in the Sex Industry

Authors and Article

The authors are Lori Dorman , Pamela Derish and Judith Cohen . Lori Dorman is a doctoral candidate in the Department of Social and Administrative Health Sciences , school of Public Health , University of California Berkeley . She is also with the Marin Institute of the Prevention of

br Alcohol and Other Drug Problems . Pamela Derish and Judith Cohen are with the Association for Women 's AIDS Research and Education (AWARE University of California , San Francisco

The project that produced the was funded by a grant from the American Foundation of AIDS Research (AmFAR ) and the authors have no reason to bias results and findings of the study . The article is peer-reviewed and was published in the journal of Health Education Quarterly , Vol . 19 (1 , in spring 1992

Overview of Study

This evaluated the Acquired immunodeficiency syndrome (AIDS prevention program among sex workers in the San Francisco Bay Area . It is unclear what mechanisms in these programs enable people to change their behavior since not enough evaluations of AIDS intervention programs exist . The study aimed to answer five questions using process and outcome evaluation . Quantitative and qualitative methods were combined to gain access to the difficult street-based community of sex workers . The mean age for women was 30 years with three-fourths of them were black . Upon entry it was found that 7 were infected with human immunodeficiency virus (HIV ) and 17 were infected with syphilis which is correlated with crack cocaine use

Former sex workers were selected as field staff to conduct the experiment . They were well-accepted in the environment of the study and became role models . The literature on diffusion of innovations emphasizes the importance of role models being near pears (Bandura 1987 , p3

Data

The data included epidemiological data , open-ended interviews , and ethnographic field notes of outreach and outing activities . The data was collected between July 1 , 1989 and June 30 , 1990

Methods Used

Both quantitative and qualitative methods were used due to the difficulty of the environment where sex workers operate . This difficulty was due to their high-mobility , constantly shifting environment economic and educational disadvantages of target groups , and illegal behaviors of prostitution and drug use . Methods used included questionnaires , open-ended interviews , and ethnographic field notes

Process Evaluation

Two factors were found important for successful recruitment . First , ease and free level of participation was exercised with no outside pressure to participate which freed the movement of participants in and out of the program . The use of former prostitute field workers who were members of the target population made them indigenous to the life of sex workers . These two factors created mutual trust between field staff and participants . Gaining access to the community at risk and understanding the context of risk behavior are necessary to successful AIDS prevention...