Sexual Risk Reduction Program Seeks Facilitators
¡Cuídate! is aimed at lowering rates of pregnancy and sexually transmitted infections in Latino youths.
Update September 20, 2013: A fifth facilitator training session has been added. Orientation will take place on Oct. 15, with training days on Oct. 24 and 25. Representatives of interested agencies may apply here.
¡Cuídate! is an evidence-based program to reduce sexual risk among Latinos. It incorporates
Latino culture to help youths make safer decisions about sex. While many sexual risk reduction programs are available, Cuídate is the first of its kind designed specifically for the Latino population by incorporating traditional expectations of gender and “machismo.”
The developer of Cuídate, Antonia M. Villarruel, Ph.D., RN, FAAN, University of Michigan School of Nursing (UMSN) Associate Dean and Professor, and Michelle L. Aebersold, Ph.D., RN, UMSN Assistant Professor, are currently looking for facilitators from agencies that serve Latino and youth populations to be trained to use Cuídate.
Facilitators will learn to lead the program successfully and comfortably in their own communities. A key innovation of the free Facilitator Training program, which is funded by the National Institutes of Health (NIH), is that trainers will participate virtually through the use of Second Life™, an online environment that UMSN has successfully used for training nursing students.
“This will be a great opportunity to utilize a virtual environment to train facilitators who will attend via their avatars,” says Dr. Aebersold. “Using a virtual program like Second Life allows people to feel like they are present in the training environment and allows us to train people from a variety of locations at one time.”
“We are looking for ways to bring training to communities in a more cost-effective and convenient way,” says Dr. Villarruel. “If we are able to train people to deliver evidence-based programs, like Cuídate, it will increase the number of adolescents who can benefit from such programs.”
The Cuídate curriculum includes training goals and objectives, interactive exercises, and discussion points. The program provides knowledge about safe sex, condom usage, and other ways to reduce risk, such as limiting the number of sexual partners and decreasing the frequency of sex. It also includes reasons to abstain from or delay sexual activity, while being culturally sensitive to the support, expectations, and pressures often found in Latino communities.
Cuídate, began accepting applications in June, with the first facilitator training session occurring in July. Other dates occurred throughout the summer and early fall. Each agency receives training materials and an incentive and must commit to running the program with participants at least twice. UMSN researchers will evaluate the experiences of the facilitators to see how closely they followed the training and what the facilitators found valuable or not.
Funding for this study comes from NIH Grant No. 1R21MH09572301A1
This release is also available in Spanish. More information: cuidate.nursing.umich.edu
