Intersectional Health Promotion and Prevention of Sexual and Gender Diverse Youth

Mentor Areas

Dr. Sanders research interests focuses on: expanding access to gender affirming care and optimizing adolescent and young adult sexual health, HIV/AIDS, and substance treatment and prevention interventions through intersectional approaches. She serves advocates for policy change in roles on the CDC/HRSA Advisory Committee (CHAC) on HIV, Viral Hepatitis and STD Prevention & Treatment; the International AIDS Society (IAS) Governing Council and the Scholarship Program, Stigma Advisory Board, Abstract Review and Collaborative Initiative for Pediatric HIV Education and Research of the IAS; the Research Review Committee of the American Board of Pediatrics; the Board of Directors of SIECUS, Sex Ed for Social Change; and American Sexual Health Association. The Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, and the National Institute of Health fund her work to develop intersectional interventions for SGDY (R01 DA043089, R01 DA059022).

Description:

Current projects include:

1. The Collaborative Care Prevention, Treatment, Navigation, Engagement, Resource (CC PrTNER) Intervention is a based off existing collaborative care models and is modified to address the specific needs of YBLMSM at-risk for or living with HIV with co-existing SUD. In partnership with Johns Hopkins University, this study occurs in two phases: (1) formative research and development of the CC PrTNER intervention and (2) a randomized control trial testing the efficacy of CC PrTNER to increase initiation of preexposure prophylaxis (PrEP) (for those at-risk for HIV), viral suppression (for those living with HIV), and engagement substance use treatment among YBLMSM aged 15 to 24 who are at-risk for a substance use disorder. We aim to enroll 275 youth across 2 cities over the next 4 years. 
2. The Primary Care Ally Project is a human centered design approach will allow the team to understand how best to ensure providers have the skills to screen, support, and link BIPOC LGBTQ youth to affirming spaces. The theory of change works backwards from the long-term outcomes to identify causal pathways and solutions to the outcomes. We will use a human-centered design (HCD) approach to identify change needed, with continuous input from the end-users (providers and patients). The goals of the project are to: developa skills-building electronic health record tool for use in primary care settings to be identify the mental health needs of BIPOC LGBTQ youth; and to examine feasibility, acceptability, and effectiveness of PCP-Ally in increasing mental health screening, identification, and linkage of BIPOC LGBTQ with a mental health diagnosis to services. 
3. The PrEP Navigation Project, Nairobi, Kenya is a CFAR-funded project with will use the Consolidated Framework for Implementation Research (CFIR)15 to identify barriers and facilitators to modify an existing peer educator program into an evidence-informed Peer PrEP Navigation (PPN) intervention for PrEP clinics and to test a pilot of the program at a youth facility in Nairobi, Kenya.
4. The Sexually Transmitted Infections Among Adolescents in Primary Care Settings in Philadelphia Project is a web-based electronic health record data base that has been developed to identify rates, barriers to and facilitators of HIV screening among AYA after a positive STI diagnosis. The secondary objective is determining associations between depression, vaccinations, tenofovir-emtricibine prescriptions (PrEP), patient and clinic-level covariates and STI incidence, repeat STIs, and STI screening.

Preferred Qualifications

Strong organizational and productivity skills; skills conducting data analysis, and/or literature review; and prior experience working with people from historically margninalized groups, people at risk for and living with HIV, and LGBTQ adolescents and young adults and their communities.

Additional plus skills include: NViVo, software analysis skills including work with STATA or SPSS