Crowdsourcing A Public Health Campaign

University of North Carolina (UNC)

Status: Completed

Conditions: HIV

Treatments: Behavioral: Crowdsourced intervention; Behavioral: Traditional intervention campaign

Study type: Interventional

Funder types: Other; NIH

Identifiers

NCT02796963

16-0851

R01AI114310 (U.S. NIH Grant/Contract)

Details and patient eligibility

About

The purpose of this stepped wedge randomized controlled trial is to evaluate the effectiveness of a crowdsourced intervention on promoting HIV testing among young Chinese men who have sex with men (MSM). The crowdsourced intervention will include an open contest, judging to determine finalists and prizes, a designathon, and contest-based MSM engagement. The hypothesis is that a crowdsourced intervention will be superior to conventional HIV test uptake campaigns in eliciting HIV test uptake.

Full description

This study will use an adaptation of the stepped wedge randomized controlled trial design. A total of eight major metropolitan cities will implement the crowdsourced intervention. These cities will be chosen based on the following criteria: 1) previous Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) MSM sentinel surveillance site; 2) capacity for campaign implementation; 3) capacity for intervention implementation at the community level. Four cities will implement more intensive in-person events to promote engagement (Guangzhou, Shenzhen in Guangdong Province, Qingdao, and Jinan in Shandong Province) during survey intervention stage. The Randomized controlled trial (RCT) will be evaluated using two different sources of data: 1) online survey data from MSM in the eight cities prior to and after the intervention; 2) CDC routine surveillance data in the eight cities prior to and after the intervention.

Enrollment: 1,381 patients

Sex: Male

Ages: 16+ years old

Volunteers: No Healthy Volunteers

Inclusion criteria

• Currently living and planning to live in one of the eight cities used in the study in the next 12 months.
• Not living with HIV
• No HIV test in the past three months
• Born biologically male and identify as either male or transgender female
• Had anal or oral sex with men at least once during their lifetime
• 16 years or older
• Willing to provide cell phone number
• Complete the informed consent document

Exclusion criteria

• Women are excluded from this study

Trial design

Primary purpose: Health Services Research

Allocation: Randomized

Interventional model: Single Group Assignment

Masking: None (Open label)

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1,381 participants in 2 patient groups

Immediate Intervention

Experimental group

Description:

Men will be exposed immediately to a comprehensive intervention promoting HIV testing.

Treatment:

Behavioral: Crowdsourced intervention

Delayed Intervention

Experimental group

Description:

Men will be exposed to a comprehensive intervention promoting HIV testing after a delay period.

Treatment:

Behavioral: Crowdsourced intervention

Behavioral: Traditional intervention campaign