Increasing access to preventive health care through cultural adaptation of effective HIV prevention interventions: a brief report from the HIV prevention in Haitian youths study.

This article describes an HIV prevention study among Haitian youths, based on the cultural adaptation of a cognitive behavioral HIV risk reduction intervention entitled "Becoming a Responsible Teen." The aim of the parent study is to evaluate whether the BART intervention is more effective than a control condition in reducing HIV risk behavior in the target population. The project explores how self-efficacy, behavioral intentions, social factors and acculturation influence the risk behavior of Haitian American adolescents. This community based translation of a risk reduction intervention, previously found to be effective in other populations, can serve as a model for reducing health disparities in a vulnerable adolescent population that lacks access to preventive health care. The purpose of this paper is to present preliminary data from the pre-assessment phase of the intervention, which enabled the project to incorporate health disparity issues with this population and address barriers to health care access.