Provision of HIV counseling and testing services at five community-based organizations among young men of color who have sex with men.

In the context of monitoring and improving CDC-funded HIV prevention programs, we describe HIV tests and infections, provision of results, previous HIV tests, and risk behaviors for young (aged 13-29) men of color who have sex with men who received HIV tests at five community-based organizations. Of 1,723 tests provided, 2.1% were positive and 75.7% of positives were previously unaware of their infection. The highest positivity rate was among men aged 25-29 (4.7%). Thirty-four percent of tests were provided to men who were tested for the first time. Over half the tests (53.2%) were provided to men who reported sex with a person of unknown HIV status, and 34% to men who reported sex with an anonymous partner. Continued and more focused prevention efforts are needed to reach and test young men of color who have sex with men and to identify previously undiagnosed HIV infections among this target population.

Counting hard-to-count populations: the network scale-up method for public health.

Estimating sizes of hidden or hard-to-reach populations is an important problem in public health. For example, estimates of the sizes of populations at highest risk for HIV and AIDS are needed for designing, evaluating and allocating funding for treatment and prevention programmes. A promising approach to size estimation, relatively new to public health, is the network scale-up method (NSUM), involving two steps: estimating the personal network size of the members of a random sample of a total population and, with this information, estimating the number of members of a hidden subpopulation of the total population. We describe the method, including two approaches to estimating personal network sizes (summation and known population). We discuss the strengths and weaknesses of each approach and provide examples of international applications of the NSUM in public health. We conclude with recommendations for future research and evaluation.

An examination of whether coordinated community responses affect intimate partner violence.

This study tests the impact of coordinated community response (CCR) on reducing intimate partner violence (IPV) and on modifying knowledge and attitudes. The authors conduct hierarchical linear modeling of data from a stratified random-digit dial telephone survey (n = 12,039) in 10 test and 10 control sites, which include 23 counties from different regions in the United States, to establish the impact of a CCR on community members' attitudes toward IPV, knowledge and use of available IPV services, and prevalence of IPV. Findings indicate that CCRs do not affect knowledge, beliefs, or attitudes of IPV, knowledge and use of available IPV services, nor risk of exposure to IPV after controlling for age, gender, ethnicity, income, and education. Women in communities with 6-year CCRs (as opposed to 3-year CCRs) are less likely to report any aggression against them in the past year. These results are discussed within the context of evaluation challenges of CCRs (e.g., IPV activities in comparison communities, variability across interventions, time lag for expected impact, and appropriateness of outcome indicators) and in light of the evidence of the impact of other community-based collaborations.

Exploring the links between components of coordinated community responses and their impact on contact with intimate partner violence services.

In the 1990s, concerns with response fragmentation for intimate partner violence (IPV) led to the promotion of coordinated community responses (CCRs) to prevent and control IPV. Evaluation of CCRs has been limited. A previous evaluation of 10 CCRs funded by the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention showed no overall impact on rates of IPV when compared to matched communities. However, there was great variability in the quality and quantity of CCR efforts between sites and thus potentially different levels of impact. This article establishes the impact of each of the 10 CCRs on women's past-year exposure to IPV and contact with IPV services and explores the associations between specific CCR components and contact with IPV services.

Latino teens talk about help seeking and help giving in relation to dating violence.

The authors examine attitudes about help seeking and help giving related to dating violence among Latino ninth graders, including survey and focus group data. Latino teens are more likely to seek help for a dating violence situation from informal sources of support (e.g., friends) than from formal sources (e.g., health professionals). Students are most likely to turn to other teens for help and do not confide or trust the adults in their social network. Teens are reluctant to intervene in dating violence situations. The quality of help offered by teens related to dating violence is perceived as being limited.

Reactions to dating violence among Latino teenagers: an experiment utilizing the Articulated Thoughts in Simulated Situations paradigm.

Dating violence is a serious problem among adolescents and young adults. Understanding teens' reactions to dating violence offers the potential to understand the factors that lead to perpetration of violent behavior and to elucidate prevention strategies. Knowledge concerning youth attitudes about dating violence is limited, and has largely come from self-report questionnaires to date. We utilized the Articulated Thoughts in Simulated Situations (ATSS) paradigm to assessing Latino teens' reactions to dating violence. Forty-one 9th grade students were presented with four simulated dating violence scenarios, and articulated their thoughts in response to them. Teens' reactions to dating violence differed on a variety of dimensions as a function of their gender, the gender of the perpetrator, and familiarity with the perpetrator.

Impact of a school-based dating violence prevention program among Latino teens: randomized controlled effectiveness trial.

PURPOSE: Given the high rate of dating violence between teens and associated deleterious outcomes, the need for effective prevention and early intervention programs is clear. Break the Cycle's Ending Violence curriculum, a three-class-session prevention program focused on legal issues, is evaluated here for its impact on Latino/a youth. METHODS: Tracks within large urban high schools that had at least 80% Latino/a students were randomized to immediate or delayed curriculum. Classrooms were randomly selected within tracks and individual student outcomes were assessed pre- and postintervention and six months later. RESULTS: Students in intervention classrooms showed improved knowledge, less acceptance of female-on-male aggression, and enhanced perception of the helpfulness and likelihood of seeking assistance from a number of sources immediately after the program. Improved knowledge and perceived helpfulness of an attorney were maintained six months later. There were no differences in recent abusive/fearful dating experiences or violence victimization or perpetration. CONCLUSIONS: The Ending Violence curriculum has an impact on teen norms, knowledge, and help-seeking proclivities that may aid in early intervention for dating violence among Latino/a students.

Child maltreatment prevention priorities at the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention.

The Division of Violence Prevention at Centers for Disease Control and Prevention's (CDC) National Center for Injury Prevention and Control has had a long-standing interest in the prevention of child maltreatment. The nation's public health agency, CDC, seeks to focus the public health perspective on the problem of child maltreatment and to promote science-based practice in the field. Since 1999, CDC has developed research priorities to address the prevention of child maltreatment. Described here is a brief rationale for applying a public health approach to child maltreatment and a discussion of the priority-setting process, priorities in each of four areas of the public health model, and some of CDC's current child maltreatment prevention activities.