RECRUITING

Parent-focused Intervention to Reduce HIV Risk in Gay and Bisexual Adolescents

Study Overview

This clinical trial focuses on testing the efficacy of different digital interventions to promote re-engagement in cancer-related long-term follow-up care for adolescent and young adult (AYA) survivors of childhood cancer.

Description

Gay and bisexual youth make up 80% of all new HIV infections among adolescents ages 14-19 in the United States, yet interventions to improve sexual health outcomes in these youth are extremely limited. Our team has developed an intervention -- Parents and Adolescents Talking about Healthy Sexuality (PATHS) -- to reduce HIV risk for gay and bisexual youth by working with their parents to improve the ways parents communicate with their sons about sexual health. The intervention is all completed by parents online and takes 45-60 minutes to complete. The goal of this study is to test whether PATHS helps improve sexual health among gay and bisexual male teens ages 14-19. To do this 350 parent-adolescent dyads will be recruited online (50% of those dyads will be racial/ethnic minority). Parents will be randomized to receive either PATHS or a control (a film designed to general support parents of gay/bisexual youth). Parents and sons will then complete surveys every 3 months over a 1-year period. Families assigned to PATHS will be compared to families assigned to the film 6 months after the intervention. Then the families originally given the control film will receive PATHS, and all dyads will be followed for another 6 months. This allows us to test the effects of PATHS in the control arm (by comparing families' experiences in the 6 months before they received the PATHS to their experiences over the next 6 months). It also allows us to test whether families who originally received PATHS will continue to benefit 9 and 12-months after the intervention. To assess sexual health, adolescents will complete self-report measures of their comfort using condoms, their access to condoms, their knowledge of the correct way to use a condom, their intentions to use condoms, their awareness of pre-exposure prophylaxis as an HIV prevention method, and their attitudes toward PrEP. If they are sexually active, they will also report about their history of condom use during sex. Adolescents will also complete a video-recorded "condom demonstration" in which they will demonstrate the appropriate technique for applying a condom, using a real condom and a oval-shaped shampoo bottle. Finally, adolescents will self-report whether they have received an HIV test in the previous year, consistent with recommendations for gay and bisexual men by the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention.

Official Title

Randomized-controlled Trial of a Parent-focused Intervention to Reduce HIV Risk in Gay and Bisexual Adolescents

Quick Facts

Study Start:2023-04-24
Study Completion:2026-08-02
Study Type:Not specified
Phase:Not Applicable
Enrollment:Not specified
Status:RECRUITING

Study ID

NCT05852600

Participation Criteria

Researchers look for people who fit a certain description, called eligibility criteria. Some examples of these criteria are a person's general health condition or prior treatments.

Ages Eligible for Study:14 Years
Sexes Eligible for Study:ALL
Accepts Healthy Volunteers:Yes
Standard Ages:CHILD, ADULT, OLDER_ADULT
Inclusion CriteriaExclusion Criteria
  1. Age 18 years or older
  2. Willing and able to provide informed consent
  3. Able to understand and follow study procedures
  4. Stable medical condition
  1. Pregnancy or breastfeeding
  2. Severe psychiatric disorders
  3. Active substance abuse
  4. Unstable medical conditions
  5. Inability to comply with study requirements

Contacts and Locations

Study Contact

David M Huebner, PhD, MPH
CONTACT
(202) 780-5893
davidhuebner@gwu.edu
Stephanie Micicco, MPH
CONTACT
smicucci@email.gwu.edu

Study Locations (Sites)

George Washington University
Washington, District of Columbia, 20052
United States

Collaborators and Investigators

Sponsor: George Washington University

Study Record Dates

These dates track the progress of study record and summary results submissions to ClinicalTrials.gov. Study records and reported results are reviewed by the National Library of Medicine (NLM) to make sure they meet specific quality control standards before being posted on the public website.

Study Registration Dates

Study Start Date2023-04-24
Study Completion Date2026-08-02

Study Record Updates

Study Start Date2023-04-24
Study Completion Date2026-08-02

Terms related to this study

Keywords Provided by Researchers

  • randomized controlled trial
  • parenting
  • sexual minority youth

Additional Relevant MeSH Terms

  • Hiv
  • Sexual Health