Assessing the HIV prevention capacity-building needs of health hepartment-based prevention program managers

Background: State and local health departments have been providing HIV prevention services to priority populations for many years. Recent research suggests that prevention program managers at health departments could benefit from individual capacity building to strengthen their public health prevention knowledge and skills. This would build organizational capacity to use behavioral science to guide prevention efforts.

Methods: A web-based survey of health department prevention program managers (n=281) was conducted to assess various factors related to training need including Perceived Need for Training, Incentives for Training, Barriers to Training, Preferred Topics/Content Areas, Preferred Format of Delivery, and Preferred Educational Level.

Results: State and local prevention program managers' have similar training needs but to differing degrees. Training is needed in multiple areas including behavioral science, evaluation and assessment, program design, cultural competency, advocacy, and strategic management. Prevention program managers would benefit from training on behavioral determinants of risk for their target populations, using that information to create or adapt programs to meet the needs of their target populations and their agencies, and on evaluating these programs. This would enable them to do their jobs better, improve their ability to make purposeful choices when designing prevention strategies and overall, improve the prevention effectiveness of their agencies.

Conclusions: Results suggest that a training initiative to build the capacity of health department prevention program managers may be necessary. An ideal training program would be a mix of onsite and online delivery, would include state and local prevention program managers, and would provide opportunities for networking.