Depressive symptoms, intrusive thoughts, sleep quality and sexual quality of life in women co-infected with human immunodeficiency virus and human papillomavirus.

BACKGROUND: Women infected with human immunodeficiency virus (HIV) experience major challenges and often report marked decreases in sexual functioning and quality of life (QOL). HIV-infected women also face challenges concerned with other commonly observed concomitant sexually transmitted organisms, such as human papillomavirus (HPV), which may further affect sexual QOL. Despite advances made in understanding factors that predict sexual functioning and QOL in men with HIV, relatively little is understood about the role of behavioural and emotional factors in women. METHODS: As a preliminary inquiry into this question, this study related depressive symptoms, AIDS-related intrusive thoughts and sleep quality with sexual QOL reports in 21 HIV+HPV+ women. RESULTS: We found that depressive symptoms, intrusive thoughts and sleep quality individually predicted poorer sexual QOL. Further analyses suggested that depression mediated the relationship between intrusive thoughts and sexual QOL. DISCUSSION: Implications for further work and clinical interventions to address depressive symptoms in this population are discussed.

Developing a collaborative community, academic, health department partnership for STD prevention: the Gonorrhea Community Action Project in Harlem.

Community interventions are rare in the field of sexually transmitted disease (STD) control and prevention. The goals of the Gonorrhea Community Action Project are to design and implement interventions for the reduction of gonorrhea in high-prevalence areas and to increase the appropriateness and effectiveness of STD care in the participating formative research and developing the interventions was the creation of a community-academic-health department collaborative partnership. Using a staged model, this article presents a case study of collaboration development in the community of Harlem, New York.