Assessing the Engagement of Transgender and Other Gender Minority Youth Across the HIV Continuum of Care

The ultimate goal of this study is to assess engagement of TGMY across the HIV Continuum of Care. This will be accomplished through a transformative multiphasic mixed-methods research study that will engage all sites in the ATN network and collect data from both internal and external sources regarding the facilitators and barriers affecting TGMY's engagement across the HIV Continuum of Care. Empirical and theoretical models will be produced that will guide the future development of HIV-related interventions for TGMY (to be published by the study team in peer-reviewed literature). In addition, findings will be translated into more immediate provider-focused recommendations and multi-media resources that provide concrete guidance and tools that can be applied across socio-ecological levels to promote the full inclusion of TGMY in the various stages of the HIV Continuum of Care. The production of multidisciplinary provider-focused materials that will support the delivery of gender affirming and appropriate HIV care to TGMY is in alignment with many contemporary views of translational research and will have an immediate impact on the ability of providers at AMTU sites and elsewhere to provide HIV-related care to TGMY across the full HIV Continuum of Care. The research design incorporates elements of both a sequential design (secondary data analysis from ATN 039 and ATN 086/106 influenced the development of measures for primary data collection) and a convergent parallel design (concurrent collection and analysis of both qualitative and quantitative primary data that will be combined to address the specific aims. This design is considered a transformative mixed-methods design due to the study's theoretical and conceptual grounding in Bioecological Systems Theory (BST), Gender Affirmation, and Gender Minority Stress, and the focus on advancing the needs of underrepresented and marginalized populations. Mixed methods studies typically involve collecting and analyzing data derived from both quantitative and qualitative data sources in order to gain greater insight into a research problem than would be gained by using only one of the two methods in isolation. By combining methods, the limitations and biases inherent in one single methodology can be lessened by using multiple forms of data collection. The qualitative phase of the study will use a phenomenological investigative approach, which will help to understand the sociocultural behaviors, language, roles, and interactions within a culture-sharing group (i.e., TGMY) and triangulation of the qualitative data with the quantitative data strengthens the validity of the information received by using a combination of data sources.