Telenovelas impact on the public health arena and implications for public health messaging and sustainability. “sin verguenza”, a four-part telenovela miniseries tackles shame and stigma in the Latino community as part of a routine HIV testing campaign

Although Latinos are disproportionately impacted by HIV, scant public health culturally and linguistically-relevant messages encourage Latinos to engage in safer sex practices and/or routine testing. To address this void, AltaMed created a family-based mini-telenovela series to reach a large Latino audience and address cultural and contextual barriers that contribute to HIV risk. Methods: AltaMed Health Services Corporation, the largest U.S. Federally Qualified Health Center, developed a four-series English and Spanish telenovela entitled “Sin Verguenza”. Telenovelas are immensely popular among Latinos throughout the US and Latin America. A web-based telenovela format was selected as a means to expand access to HIV-related educational media. The series is featured on You-tube and Facebook and offers both entertainment and salient public health messages, which include sexuality and safer sex, HIV testing, the importance of education, homophobia, gender roles, and information that HIV is a treatable and manageable disease. Results: The telenovela medium has attracted a diverse Latino audience throughout Southern California and ten Latin American countries. Viewer characteristics have been collected and will be presented. New media video-sharing platforms have broadened AltaMed's viewership proving that novelas are an effective way of reaching a broad at-risk population that might not otherwise perceive themselves as at-risk. Conclusions: AltaMed's “Sin Verguenza” telenovela project posits a cost-effective and viable model for delivering public health messages and increasing Latinos perception of risk. Web-based, culturally relevant, multi-lingual telenovelas appear to be a successful method for reaching Latinos on a global level.