A Systematic Review of Recent Smartphone, Internet and Web 2.0 Interventions to Address the HIV Continuum of Care

Abstract

eHealth, mHealth and “Web 2.0” social media strategies can effectively reach and engage key populations in HIV prevention across the testing, treatment, and care continuum. To assess how these tools are currently being used within the field of HIV prevention and care, we systematically reviewed recent (2013–2014) published literature, conference abstracts, and funded research. Our searches identified 23 published intervention studies and 32 funded projects underway. In this synthesis we describe the technology modes applied and the stages of the HIV care cascade addressed, including both primary and secondary prevention activities. Overall trends include use of new tools including social networking sites, provision of real-time assessment and feedback, gamification and virtual reality. While there has been increasing attention to use of technology to address the care continuum, gaps remain around linkage to care, retention in care, and initiation of antiretroviral therapy.

Social Media Use and HIV-Related Risk Behaviors in Young Black and Latino Gay and Bi Men and Transgender Individuals in New York City: Implications for Online Interventions

“…38 Although many studies of Internet-based behavioral interventions for HIV have been published, 39 only a handful of social media-based HIV interventions exists 9,10,[40][41][42][43] with several more in the pipeline. 12 Behavioral interventions leveraging online social networks have the potential to affect population health dramatically, given their capacity to disseminate information virally, facilitate social support, and modify norms. 38,44 However, best practices for this field are unknown and still evolving, and developmental research is needed to understand how to more effectively harness social media to create more impactful behavioral interventions.…”

“…[9][10][11][12] The use of social media among adolescents and young adults is nearly universal, 13 with 92 % of adolescents connecting to the Internet daily and about 24 % reporting using the Internet Balmost constantly.^1 4 Results of national and urban surveys indicate that MSM are more likely to use social media to seek sexual and/or romantic partners when compared to their heterosexual counterparts. [15][16][17] A growing body of literature exists that has specifically examined social media use and HIV risk behaviors and/or STIs among MSM and transgender populations; in general, these studies indicate a positive association between social media use for partner seeking and HIV risk behaviors.…”

Testing the Efficacy of a Social Networking Gamification App to Improve Pre-Exposure Prophylaxis Adherence (P3: Prepared, Protected, emPowered): Protocol for a Randomized Controlled Trial (Preprint)

“…[23, 24, 25, [44-46] However, there is currently a lack of evidenced-based interventions targeting adherence to PrEP. [45] P3 is the first intervention to include gamification to increase PrEP adherence among YMSM and YTWSM. Gamification uses game design components and principles of psychology outside of gaming contexts, thus providing opportunities for sophisticated engagement of participants in online behavioral interventions.…”

“…Health behavior interventions can utilize gamification to deliver highly engaging content, enhancing the degree and depth of participant interaction and increasing behavior change learning opportunities. [45][46][47] Measurement of plasma for intracellular drug concentration will be the primary outcome for this study. This approach is considered the "gold standard" for determining if and how often an antiretroviral has been taken.…”

“Testing is Healthy” TimePlay campaign: Evaluation of sexual health promotion gamification intervention targeting young adults

“…4 Such platforms have been considered potentially cost-effective compared with conventional methods such as face-to-face interventions, which often require facilitator training and material costs, or with traditional mass-media campaigns (e.g., television, radio and newspapers), which are generally passive and costly. 5,27,28 Second, TimePlay exposes the movie audience to the campaign regardless of their participation in the application, maximizing the reach, which we aimed to quantify in this study. Our results show that our campaign using the TimePlay application had a wide reach (77 149 TimePlay participations and 471 261 who viewed the campaign, but did not participate in the TimePlay application).…”