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

New Law Pits Internet Against Women's Rights

Women in Oklahoma, beware, the Web is being used against you..

Update: As part of the legal challenge against the bill, the start of enforcement has been postponed until December 4, so that the judge could "look further into the case." Stay tuned...

Instead of using technology to increase access to care, broaden the range of options for care and unite consumers in pursuit of care, Oklahoma legislators are hoping to bring the state back to the time of the Salem witch trials or Nathaniel Hawthorne, take your pick.

As of November 1, you'll have another, higher hurdle to jump to get an abortion in your state. Starting on that date, you'll be asked more than 30 personal questions about yourself, including your race, marital status, age, medical history and reasons for getting an abortion. If it wasn't enough that only 4% of Oklahoma counties even have an abortion provider, those practitioners will have to submit that personal information to the state Health Department, which will then post the answers on a public website. No, it won't include your name and other "identifying information," but I'm sure that's small comfort to women from small towns, especially those of a racial or ethnic minority, God forbid.

Pro-choice groups have filed a lawsuit contending the bill tackles more than one subject at once, a violation of the Oklahoma constitution, and a preliminary hearing is scheduled for October 30. In case you were dubious, this procedural gambit has worked before, in the case of a bill requiring women to get a graphic description of an ultrasound before being allowed to get an abortion.

For more information:
See the text of the bill here -- It's HR 1595

Center for Reproductive Rights case information

GetSTDtested.com sponsors webisode: The 'O' Mission

Is Indya going to get tested using getSTDtested.com?? So far I've just watched the first four webisodes of a new series called The 'O' Mission, which aims to normalize sexual health conversations between peers and lead viewers back to sponsor getSTDtested.com to follow suit.

The 'O' Mission recruited real, accomplished musicians to play the band and has gone on a film tour starting with Columbia College Chicago in May of this year. This marketing tactic, unique and obviously expensive, will be interesting to follow. I couldn't find the videos on Youtube yet, but it would be nice if the story was easier to share with friends. Also interesting is that The 'O' Mission mentions getSTDtested.com at every 'commercial,' yet, getSTDtested.com doesn't highlight the connection. Perhaps a smart move to bring in a certain audience, with out alienating everyone else who might not connect as well to Indya and the 'O' Mission crew.

A Reuters article about the webisodes and the getSTDtested.com connection highlights the fact that this is a resource heavy campaign, but it could make a larger dent with better engagement of networks and sharing tools. Maybe that's coming.

Is Indya STD prevention's new darling?? Stay tuned.

PEP for HIV Exposure? A New Widget's Maiden Voyage

Post-exposure prophylaxis, or PEP for short, is a course of anti-retroviral drugs that can reduce the risk of HIV sero-conversion after an exposure if taken in a timely manner. The guidelines for administering PEP have changed over time, and for doctors deciding when to go for it hasn't always been clear.

Now there's a widget to help!

The New York Times reported today about the release of a new tool to 200 emergency room doctors in New York State. The tool "walks users through a screening process to determine whether they are candidates for treatment, provides specific information about the 28-day course of antiretroviral drugs, and even links to consent forms in 22 languages, including Creole, Laotian and Yoruba."

The tool can be easily updated by the health department with changes in recommendations and statistics so that the doctors can always have the latest to go on. And with the critical window for PEP at less than 72 hours, its time that decision making is made easier. I'd be happy to see an evaluation of this trial period, and if successful, expansion to others states. Perhaps there are other health care decision making models that can be digitized. We'll see.

2009 School Wellness Conference

The California School Boards Association, the California Department of Education and the California Department of Public Health will bring together a diverse group of school community leaders who play a role in creating sustainable healthy school environments. The 2009 School Wellness Conference, in Anaheim California, October 6th - 7th, will build on the inaugural conference that focused on best practices and resources; statewide success stories and model program workshops; improved access to healthy foods and physical activity opportunities; sample district policies that promote health on school campuses; and strategies to help schools succeed in implementing and evaluating their local school wellness policies. The 2009 School Wellness Conference will:

* Address critical health issues and their link to student academic achievement;
* Focus on school governance and leadership.
* Bring together school and community leaders to share collaborative and coordinated school health approaches; and
* Address health disparities and support a cultural shift toward healthier students.

The conference registration fee is $275. On September 19, the conference registration rate will increase to $350. For more information or to register for the conference, go to http://swc.csba.org/.

The new School Wellness Conference room rate is $110 single/double, $130 triple, $150 quad plus applicable taxes. Call Marriott reservations directly at (800) 228-9290. Reference the School Wellness Conference to receive this special rate.

Join us on October 5 for the pre-conference event, Finding common ground: Collaborating to prevent childhood obesity which will explore the foundations of collaboration among schools, cities and others. Specifically, it will address strategies for collaboration around nutrition, physical activity, joint-use of indoor and outdoor recreational facilities, as well as safe routes to school with four interactive sessions and group discussions that speak to overcoming key barriers to collaboration. Attendees will be given resources and materials, such as toolkits and resource guides, as well as sample guiding principles for collaboration, joint-use agreements, school board policies and a checklist for starting a collaborative.

The pre-conference session will be offered at no charge on a first come basis to those who register for the conference. To register for the School Wellness Conference and pre-conference, visit http://swc.csba.org.

Get Live, Stay Live Was A Huge Success!

The first ever Get Live, Stay Live Health & Arts Showcase was a resounding success. Over 300 youth and their parents came down to the Bayview Opera House on Saturday, July 25th, to check out performances from DJ Truth, Bread Me Out Family, RoachGigz, Young Bari, San Quinn and many more local artists. Ten percent of the attendees were tested on-site, and 150 visited a clinic prior to the event to pick up an access card for free admission! Our host Marcus tore the house down with safer sex messages, while SFDPH’s YUTHE Team, BMagic, No More Funerals, 3rd Street Clinic, New Generations Health Clinic and other organizations helped hold it down.

Visit www.getlivestaylive.org frequently for pictures and updates. We are beyond privileged and proud to have hosted an event like this for youth in the Bayview while collaborating with our partner organizations. A huge thank you to everyone that made Get Live, Stay Live possible! We can’t wait for the next Get Live, Stay Live event slated for October 2009! Hope to see you there.

Shame shame - STD defamation website makes it personal

When a person gets diagnosed with an STD, its courtesy to contact current and former partners and let them know. This way they can take care of themselves too and everyone is happier. If it sounds scary there are systems in place to help you, like the STD division of your local public health department or inSPOT.org. These systems have been built with yours and your partners' privacy in mind.

So...I wasn't too happy this morning when I saw this article thud into my inbox. Put out by Citizen-Times.com, the article titled "Web site lists people with STDs -- Whether they have them or not," made me super grumpy. The site professes to be an international list of people with STDs. And anyone can post an addition to the site, regardless of truth. And yes, there is a list of names, complete with city, state, age and gender.

But, slow down a second. What if it is true? Isn't that person owed the same courtesy they just showed their partner by telling them in confidence? Don't we want to be reinforcing the habit of privately sharing this information with those who need to know because their health depends on it? Can't the response simply be, "Thank you for telling me. I'll get tested."

So what can we do here? Public humiliation is obviously going to dig us deeper in the wrong direction.

1. If you are sexually active make testing regularly part of your routine. Go with a friend if that helps. Get online and tap into the HIVtest.org database that includes both STD and HIV testing resources nationally. In San Francisco, STDtest.org provides a private, cheap way to test, with results securely accessed online by a unique identifier.

2. Share your results with your partner(s) and inquire about theirs. Build trust and sleep easier. Need help figuring out what to say? That's normal. Here's a guide.

3. Learn about the STDs and how they are transmitted, treated and prevented. Inspot.org has easily digestible information as does SF City Clinic.

Global Youth Demand Action

Where were you 15 years ago? Maybe you were already working or looking for work, maybe you were in college or grade school, maybe you weren't even born yet.

But officials from 179 countries got together in Cairo, Egypt, in the fall of 1994 and promised to change the world in 20 years. The result of the International Conference on Population and Development (ICPD) was a ambitious plan that would, among other benefits, give universal access to services and information to improve the sexual and reproductive health of everyone by 2015.

Fast forward to today, with just over five years to go, and we have a lot of work to do.

Using technology that was just a glimmer in some developers' eyes 15 years ago, young people around the world are taking their sexual health and their future in their own hands. Earlier this month, the International Planned Parenthood Federation (IPPF) launched the 15andCounting campaign on social networking platforms MXit, Facebook and Twitter - urging young people around the world to call their governments to task and demand action.

According to the campaign, "too many governments have failed to make good on their promises. This failure puts the lives and health of tens-of-millions of young people at risk." To put this in context, those born in 1994 form part of the largest group of young people the world has ever seen – some 1.5 billion. With these numbers, as I'm sure we all know, their health and wellbeing affects all of us.

Toward this end, the campaign offers a petition that will be presented to the United Nations to demand governments act now to "fulfill their promise to provide better access to sexual and reproductive health services for all young people."

More than 25,000 people from around the world have signed it so far, mostly young people. The campaign has a goal of "hundreds of thousands of signatures representing every country on the planet."

From their website: "We are asking all governments around the world to prioritise [sic] young people’s sexual and reproductive health and rights, including comprehensive sex education and information and youth friendly health services."

For more information, check out these links:

15andcounting
Join 15andcounting on Facebook
Follow 15andcounting on Twitter