Dipping a Toe in the River

While visions of walls of paper files have portrayed health care providers as the last relic in the old school, a group of public health professionals has rallied around the cause of emerging technologies. The National Coalition of STD Directors (NCSD) this week released its final "Guidelines for Internet-Based STD and HIV Prevention," covering a wide range of technologies from banner ads to video games and mobile phones.

From the latest addition, Guidelines for Health Communications: "While the various websites and communication platforms covered in this document are popular and in wide use today, it is important to acknowledge that trends and technologies will certainly change. The arrival of new, currently unknown, technologies can be expected as can the use of these new media by our target populations. As such, it is important that public health professionals stay aware of, even track, how our target populations are using the various technologies and continually strive to meet them where they are. At a minimum, a periodic assessment of how your target audiences use electronic media is suggested."

The guidelines also include resources for further reading and tools for building and evaluating an Internet campaign, just to give an example.

For more information: Guidelines for Internet-Based STD and HIV Prevention