Background: EHealth technology has significantly impacted HIV prevention strategies, but reach to African American women has been scarce.
Objectives:To explore the feasibility, acceptability, and preference of an avatar-led, eHealth video to increase awareness and knowledge of HIV post and pre-exposure prophylaxis (PEP and PrEP) in a sample of African American women.
Methods:A cross-sectional, descriptive, online study was conducted with 116 African American women ages 18 to 61. We explored: 1) consumer-awareness, 2) intention to use, and 3) preference for post and pre-exposure prophylaxis after watching the eHealth video.Results: Eighty-nine percent rated the video as good or higher. A higher rating of the educational video was significantly predicted by: no current use of drugs/alcohol (β = -.814, p = .004); not having unprotected sex in the last 3 months (β =-.488, p = .025); higher income (β =.149, p = . 026); lower level of education (β =-.267, p = .005); and, a lower exposure to sexual assault since age 18 (β =-.313, p = .004). After watching the eHealth video, interest in both, PEP and PrEP was high, with intentions to use PEP and PrEP being 96.7% and 75.6% respectively. Ninety-three percent reported recommending PEP and 90.1% PrEP to other women.
Conclusions:Utilization of an avatar-led, eHealth, online video fostered education about PEP and PrEP. We can leverage this approach to increase awareness and usage among African American women.