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Background: Little is known about healthcare providers' (HCPs) contraceptive views for adolescents in Haiti, who experience high rates of unintended pregnancy. We sought to describe HCPs' perspectives on barriers and facilitators to contraceptive care delivery in rural Haiti. Methods: We conducted a cross-sectional survey and qualitative interviews with HCPs in two rural communities in Haiti from 08/2021–03/2022. We assessed demographics, clinical practice behaviors and explored contraception perspectives according to Theory of Planned Behavior constructs: attitudes, subjective norms, and perceived behavioral control (e.g., people's perceptions of their ability to perform a given behavior, barriers and facilitators of a behavior).15–17 We used descriptive statistics to report proportions and responses to Likert scale and multiple-choice questions. Guided by content analysis, we analyzed interview transcripts through thematic inductive coding and team debriefing. Results: Among 58 respondents, 90% (n = 52) were female and 53% (n = 31) were nurses. Most reported always (n = 16, 28%) or very often (n = 21, 36%) obtaining a sexual history for adolescents. A majority agreed/strongly agreed that clinicians should discuss pregnancy prevention (n = 45, 78%), high-risk sexual behaviors (n = 40, 69%), and should prescribe contraception (n = 41, 71%) to adolescents. The most frequently cited provider-level barriers (i.e., significant or somewhat of a barrier) included insufficient contraception knowledge (n = 44, 77%) and time (n = 37, 64%). HCPs were concerned about barriers at the patient-level (e.g. adolescents' fear of parental notification [n = 37, 64%], adolescents will give inaccurate information about sexual behaviors [n = 25, 43%]) and system-level (e.g. resistance to providing care from administration [n = 33, 57%]). In interviews (n = 17), HCPs generally supported contraception care for adolescents. Many HCPs echoed our quantitative findings on concerns about privacy and confidentiality. HCPs reported concerns about lack of contraception education leading to misconceptions, and community and parental judgement. HCPs expressed interest in further contraception training and resources and noted the importance of providing youth-friendly contraceptive care. Conclusions: While HCPs support contraceptive care, we identified actionable barriers to improve care for adolescents in rural Haiti. Future efforts should include increasing HCP knowledge and training, community and parent coalition building to increase contraception support and offering youth-friendly contraceptive care to offset risk for related adverse health outcomes in adolescents in rural Haiti. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Effective sexual health education provides individuals medically accurate knowledge and promotes the skills necessary for positive behaviors related to sexual health. This qualitative study employs focus groups to examine learning experiences of nine participating adolescents from a comprehensive youth empowerment and sexual health virtual summer program (The YES! Program). Focus group interviews were coded using inductive analysis to compute student learning themes (safety and prevention, preparation, and communication) and utterance coverage. Narrative inquiry highlighted the experiences of the participants. The results highlight students' learning experiences through participation in the YES! Program and the skill outcomes of comprehensive sexual health education. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This article describes the design and validation of a scale for evaluating reproductive and sexual health. 919 young females from 11 to 19 years in five Caribbean- Colombian cities were administered the questionnaire that assesses attitudes and subjective norms about the reproductive sexuality, based on the planned behavior theory (Ajzen & Fishbein, 2000). The reliability and validity of the instrument was analyzed through exploratory factorial analysis with principal components and VARIMAX rotation. The methodology includes two independent studies; in study 1 (pilot test) the first questionnaire consisted of 172 items and decreased to 78 in the final sample. For study 2, the attitude scale reported (Mean = 3.68, ED = 1.21) and Cronbach's alpha reliability was 0.91. Two factors were extracted and grouped into two dimensions that explain 67.10% of the variance. For the subjective norms scale (Mean = 3.8, ED = 1.1) Cronbach's alpha reliability was 0.97 and eleven factors were extracted and grouped into nine dimensions, which explain 75.89% of the variance. The scale showed good reliability and structural stability for the analysis and design of programs for sexual and reproductive health in adolescent girls. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]