BACKGROUND
Latino/a/x individuals remain disproportionately impacted by HIV, particularly Latino/a/x men who have sex with men (MSM) and transgender women (TW). Pre-exposure prophylaxis (PrEP) is an effective means of biomedical HIV prevention, but awareness and uptake remain low among marginalized Latino/a/x populations. Social marketing campaigns have demonstrated promise in promoting PrEP in other populations but are poorly studied in Latino/a/x MSM and TW.
OBJECTIVE
1) To adapt and pilot a PrEP social marketing campaign tailored to Latino/a/x MSM and TW through community-based participatory research (CBPR), and 2) To evaluate the reach and ad performance of the adapted PrEP social marketing campaign
METHODS
We used the assessment, decision, adaptation, production, topical experts-integration, training, testing (ADAPT-ITT) framework for adapting evidence-based interventions (EBIs) for new settings or populations. This manuscript presents how each phase of the ADAPT-ITT framework was applied via CBPR to create the PrEPárate (“Be PrEPared”) campaign. Campaign reach and ad performance was measured through social media platform metrics and website data.
RESULTS
The PrEPárate campaign reached over 118,750 people over social media (55,750 over Meta, 63,000 over TikTok). In the first year, there were 5,006 visitors to the website.
CONCLUSIONS
Adaptation of an existing EBI served as an effective method for developing a PrEP social marketing campaign for Latino/a/x individuals. CBPR and strong community partnerships were essential to tailor materials and systematically address barriers to PrEP access. Social marketing is a promising strategy to improve awareness and access to PrEP among underserved Latino/a/x populations.