Recruitment and Retention of Sex Worker ParticipantsPosted on January 20, 2009 Victoria D. Ojeda (bio) explains the partnerships that facilitate research with sex workers in Tijuana. |
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One of the issues in terms of working with sex workers and recruiting them to participate in our studies has to do, in order to be successful at it, we have established a partnership with local NGOs, non-governmental organizations, in Tijuana. And in particular we work with the state HIV/AIDS services coordinator, a physician, Dr. Losada, in Tijuana, and so that partnership has really helped our studies be successful.
As an American agency to come in, or as American researchers to come into the community, kind of just parachute in, it's just it's not a viable option. You really need to have local partnerships with local researchers and local, in our case, local physicians and local providers.
And the folks that we are working with have both the research skills and the professional skills to deliver services to this population, and so I think one advantage beyond that particular setup, that we've established binational collaborations now with research entities, with research universities, and with the local healthcare system. We're also doing outreach to the local bars and places of employment for the women, so that has helped buy trust from the community.
And the other thing is we've been there now for about four years in the city of Tijuana, and we have a house that we call the previn casa, which is like a prevention house. And so at that house we have a range of services that are prevention, HIV/AIDS prevention services.
So folks can come to our house not only for research activities, because we have several research projects going on simultaneously, so that the presence of the various research projects along with the fact that the house is open to the community pretty much all the time. We're there morning, day, and night, and on weekends and so forth. So I think that has really facilitated our work there and, I think, made it a much richer experience for everybody.
We also have a little mobile van, and so it goes around the community distributing condoms and passing out health information. So that has helped increase our awareness in the community and just make people familiar, increase familiarity with our services that we're providing, as well as the research projects that folks might be eligible to participate in.
As an American agency to come in, or as American researchers to come into the community, kind of just parachute in, it's just it's not a viable option. You really need to have local partnerships with local researchers and local, in our case, local physicians and local providers.
And the folks that we are working with have both the research skills and the professional skills to deliver services to this population, and so I think one advantage beyond that particular setup, that we've established binational collaborations now with research entities, with research universities, and with the local healthcare system. We're also doing outreach to the local bars and places of employment for the women, so that has helped buy trust from the community.
And the other thing is we've been there now for about four years in the city of Tijuana, and we have a house that we call the previn casa, which is like a prevention house. And so at that house we have a range of services that are prevention, HIV/AIDS prevention services.
So folks can come to our house not only for research activities, because we have several research projects going on simultaneously, so that the presence of the various research projects along with the fact that the house is open to the community pretty much all the time. We're there morning, day, and night, and on weekends and so forth. So I think that has really facilitated our work there and, I think, made it a much richer experience for everybody.
We also have a little mobile van, and so it goes around the community distributing condoms and passing out health information. So that has helped increase our awareness in the community and just make people familiar, increase familiarity with our services that we're providing, as well as the research projects that folks might be eligible to participate in.
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Excerpted from an interview with researcher at the 2008 National Hispanic Science Network on Drug Abuse Conference in Bethesda, MD.
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