Can mainstream services learn from male only sexual health pilot projects?

Over the past decade a number of community based sexual health projects aimed solely at young men have proved to be very successful at attracting young men into genitourinary medicine services. These projects are often short term funded and under evaluated so it isn't clear exactly how successful they are and why this might be so. These projects should be carefully evaluated and examined to elicit factors, either unique or common in nature, which could be utilised by mainstream sexual health services wishing to develop work with young men. There are many barriers to this happening in mainstream services, some being resource and time problems and others to do with values of staff and lack of quality training. The article looks at practical ways that working with men and the skills and confidence of staff can be improved in mainstream settings while recognising that much of what needs to be done to support the needs of young men must take place in the planning and commissioning stage of services.