Protegiendo Nuestra Comunidad: empowerment participatory education for HIV prevention.

To be effective, HIV/AIDS interventions must be culturally and linguistically appropriate and must occur within the context of the specific community in which they are delivered. In this article, the development of a culture-specific lay health advisor (LHA) program, Protegiendo Nuestra Comunidad, for recently immigrated Mexicans is described. This program is one component of a collaborative inquiry research project involving community participants and researchers working as partners in carrying out and assessing a program for the prevention of HIV/AIDS. The collaborative inquiry process was applied as an empowerment philosophy and methodology of Paulo Freire and an ecological framework was used for the development of Protegiendo Nuestra Comunidad. The use of principles of empowerment for curriculum development, teaching methodology, and program delivery are described.

Latino recruitment and retention strategies: community-based HIV prevention.

Latinos are disproportionately affected by HIV/AIDS. The need for community-based AIDS prevention programs that are culture specific is well recognized. Lay Health Advisor (LHA) interventions are a culturally appropriate way to provide information about HIV/AIDS to community members. LHA programs use natural helpers in the community to disseminate information through their social networks. Natural helpers are community members who informally provide support to their neighbors and to whom others naturally turn for advice. This paper reports the recruitment and retention experiences of a Lay Health Advisor Program: Protegiendo Nuestra Familia (Protecting Our Family) for prevention of HIV/AIDS among Latinos in North Carolina.

Sexual prevention of HIV: a model for Latinos.

Despite reductions in AIDS deaths in the general population, Latino AIDS deaths in the United States have been increasing. The underlying cause of the rising HIV infection rates in the U.S. Latino population is not fully understood. Focus groups among Mexicans in North Carolina revealed methods of prevention that were different from those recommended by the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC). A research-based Mexican model of HIV prevention is proposed and contrasted with a model deducted from CDC prevention strategies. Recently immigrated Mexicans may be unlikely to adopt the CDC model of HIV prevention due to their culturally specific views of prevention.

The timing is never right: Mexican views of condom use.

Unprotected sex is a critical issue in the Hispanic community, with the incidence of new Hispanic acquired immune deficiency syndrome (AIDS) cases three times that of non-Hispanic Whites. The researchers used focus groups to examine: (a) whether newly immigrated Mexican men and women in the Southeast United States discussed human immunodeficiency virus (HIV)/sexually transmitted disease (STD) prevention with each other, and (b) how condom use was discussed. For the women, communication was safe sex, and for the men, trust was safe sex. Both communication and trust were dependent on timing in the relationship. Participants could not discuss condoms in a new or established relationship because of issues of trust. This study highlights the complexity of HIV/STD prevention and suggests that trust and timing should be considered within the cultural context of condom introduction.

After-the-fact strategies Mexican Americans use to prevent HIV and STDs.

Hispanics make up less than 10% of the U.S. population but account for 83,923 (17%) of all U.S AIDS cases and are disproportionately affected by sexually transmitted diseases (STDs). Nurses have a mandate to provide culturally competent care, but to do so, they must understand what their clients' needs are and how best to deliver nursing care. A key finding of this exploratory focus group study with newly immigrated Mexican Americans in North Carolina was that respondents were actively striving to prevent HIV or STDs. Their preventive practices for both HIV and STDs centered around a "gonorrhea model" of prevention and casual transmission. The emphasis was not on the biomedical model of transmission or prevention (condoms use). The findings also suggested that the level of counseling for prevention needs to be targeted differently for men than for women.

Theoretical substruction: a guide for theory testing research.

This article demonstrates how theoretical substruction with its various levels of abstraction can be used as a guide for theory testing research. The article describes a method for substructing research hypotheses as well as an entire study. Substruction and its benefits, including assuring the internal consistency of model testing, are discussed as applied to a study testing hypotheses derived from proposition two of Orem's self-care deficit theory of nursing. This approach to theory testing is congruent with the coherence theory of truth and promises to contribute to the advancement of nursing epistemology.

The relationship of risk factors for cervical cancer and HPV in college women.

Cervical human papillomavirus (HPV) is responsible for a dramatic increase in abnormal Pap smears among young women. All cervical HPV must be treated clinically as having malignant potential. This article reviews risk factors for cervical HPV and reports the results of a study on the relationship of those factors and demographic variables with the incidence of cervical HPV as indicated by Pap smears in a student health population.