A randomized controlled trial of an HIV prevention intervention for street-based female sex workers in Yerevan, Armenia: preliminary evidence of efficacy.

This study evaluated the efficacy of an HIV intervention among female sex workers (FSWs) randomized to an intervention or wait-list control. FSWs (N = 120) completed baseline, 3- and 6-month assessments. A health educator implemented 2-hour intervention emphasized gender-empowerment, self-efficacy to persuade clients to use condoms, condom application skills, and eroticizing safer sex. Over the 6-month follow-up, FSWs in the intervention reported more consistent condom use with clients (P = .004) and were more likely to apply condoms on clients (P = .0001). Intervention effects were observed for other psychosocial mediators of safer sex. Brief, gender and culturally congruent interventions can enhance HIV-preventive behaviors among FSWs.

Mental health in Armenia.

Armenia is a landlocked mountainous country between the Black Sea and the Caspian Sea, in the southern Caucasus. It shares borders with Turkey to the west, Georgia to the north, Azerbaijan to the east, and Iran and the Nakhchivan exclave of Azerbaijan to the south. Its total area is 29 743 km2. A former republic of the Soviet Union, Armenia is a unitary, multi-party, democratic nation state with an ancient cultural heritage. Armenia prides itself on being the first nation formally to adopt Christianity (in the early 4th century).