Designing and disseminating culturally relevant sexual health interventions for indigenous youth

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Craig Rushing S, Gaston A, Shegog R, Markham C, Torres J, Gorman G, Jessen C and Williamson J

Northwest Portland Area Indian Health Board, USA
University of Texas School of Public Health, USA
Inter-Tribal Council of Arizona, USA
Alaska Native Tribal Health Consortium, USA

: J Virol Antivir Res

Abstract

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To be effective, sexual health curricula must be ageappropriate, culturally-relevant, and reflect the values and learning styles of the learners being taught. Finding curricula that meet these requirements for American Indian and Alaska Native youth can be challenging. Healthy Native Youth (HNY) is an online portal designed by a team of advisers representing a diverse group of American Indian and Alaska Native (AI/AN) tribal communities to provide a ‘one-stop-shop’ for tribal health advocates to access ageappropriate sexual health curricula. HNY allows users to determine ‘best-fit’ by filtering and comparing curricula on age, delivery setting, duration, cost, and evidence of effectiveness. The site includes all implementation materials for facilitator training, lesson planning, marketing and recruitment, evaluation, and background information on program design publications and reports on impact. Once such curricula, Native VOICES, is the first evidence-based intervention recognized by the U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention for preventing HIV and other STDs among American Indian and Alaska Native youth. Since its launch in August 2016, the www.HealthyNativeYouth.org portal has demonstrated broad reach both domestically and internationally, with over 14K homepage views and over 3K curricula page views accessed from 50 U.S. states and 57 countries.

Biography

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Stephanie Craig Rushing has completed the Masters of Public Health at Boston University and PhD in Public Administration and Policy at the Hatfield School of Government at Portland State University. Presently she is the Project Director at the Northwest Portland Area Indian Health Board. Her work focuses on designing and evaluating interventions to improve adolescent health, including an online portal for tribal health educators to access effective sexual health curricula, and We R Native (www.weRnative.org) a multimedia health resources that empowers Native teens to get actively involved in their health and wellbeing. Her research focuses on Community Health and Social Change.