Cultivating a Sense of Belonging in Allied Health Education: An Approach Based on Mindfulness Anti-Oppression Pedagogy.

To address accreditation standards and to meet a need due to a disparity in health care providers engaged in direct patient care, many institutions of higher education have focused on initiatives to increase the numbers of ethnic and racial minority populations. Despite these efforts, there remains a dearth of diversity in health care. For many underrepresented minority populations (URM), numerous barriers exist to becoming a health professional. Greater levels of discrimination and bias reduce belonging and agency in URM students impacting recruitment and retention. Research has shown that discrimination and bias are antithetical to feeling a sense of belonging on college campuses for URM students. The sense of belonging for URM students has been positively linked to retention and other academic outcomes. Faculty interaction and campus environment have been correlated to sense of belonging. Thus, faculty members as mentors, advisors, and shapers of campus climate have an important role to play in supporting URM students. However, due to socialization in an oppressive society, narratives about race and racism can become entrenched. The entrenchment of racial ideologies, without tools to examine, deconstruct, and reflect, leads to little forward progress. Incorporation of mindfulness anti-oppression pedagogy provides a needed paradigm shift for allied health educators to act with intentionality as they cultivate spaces of belonging for URM students.

Decision Processes about Condom Use among Shelter-Homeless LGBT Youth in Manhattan.

Health behavior interventions based on Theory of Planned Behavior address participants' personally-held beliefs, perceived social norms, and control over the behavior. New data are always needed to "member check" participants' decision processes and inform interventions. This qualitative study investigates decision processes around condom use among 81 homeless LGBT youth ages 18-26. Findings indicated considerable endorsement of the conventional policy of always using condoms, promulgated in HIV prevention education targeting this population. Although some participants reported risk behavior in contexts of sex work, survival sex, casual encounters, open relationships, and substance use, most were aware of these risks and consistently safe in those situations. Condoms use boundaries became vulnerable in states of emotional need and negative mood. The only effect participants acknowledged of homelessness on condom use was indirect, through negative mood states. The most prevalent context of condom non-use was with long-term primary partners, a potential area of vulnerability because, of 13 participants for HIV or HCV, nine mentioned how they had been infected, and all nine believed they had acquired it from a primary partner. Findings imply programs should emphasize HIV risk potential within long-term romantic partnerships and mental health services to remediate negative mood states.