8 Best Practices for HIV Prevention among Trans People

  1. Ground Your Work in the Community.
    Develop partnerships with trans people and organizations to create and grow programs, services and research with, by, and for trans people. Community involvement ensures acceptability, appropriateness, and relevance of your interventions, programs and services to the trans people.
  2. Race & Ethnicity: One Size Does Not Fit All.
    Interventions and programs are most effective when they incorporate racial and ethnic issues that contribute to HIV risk and issues of stigma and discrimination that are specific to trans people.
  3. Utilize Multidisciplinary Approaches to HIV Prevention.
    Educate and provide services and care through a broader context of health and wellness. Consider approaches that focus not only on the individual, but also on families, social networks, schools, communities, and organizations in which transgender people live, work, and play.
  4. Get the Facts! Assess, Evaluate, & Enhance.
    Conduct thorough needs assessments and evaluations, use the data in program planning an improvement, and disseminate what you learned.
  5. Looking in All the Right Places.
    Recruitment and retention strategies should consider the unique needs and circumstances of priority populations. Make an effort to go beyond what was convenient, and bring education and services to trans people in their neighborhoods and communities.
  6. Increase Access to Health Care for Trans People.
    Have a central or multiple locations with easy access to public transportation, provide services in multiple languages, and have trained providers who understand current HIV and health care issues of trans people. Provide hormone therapy as part of primary care.
  7. Invest In Developing and Supporting Your Staff.
    Prioritizing staff development, providing ongoing training and education, and creating opportunities for advancement are key to building capacity and healthy work environments for staff members and their clients and patients.
  8. Advocate for Structural and Systemic Change on Behalf of Trans People.
    Collaborate with community partners to advocate for policy development and social change to identify and address how HIV among trans people is impacted by housing, employment, transphobia, racism, violence, lack of health insurance, provider education, and legalized discrimination.