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Purpose of reviewTo explore the intersection of chatbots and HIV prevention and care. Current applications of chatbots in HIV services, the challenges faced, recent advancements, and future research directions are presented and discussed.Recent findingsChatbots facilitate sensitive discussions about HIV thereby promoting prevention and care strategies. Trustworthiness and accuracy of information were identified as primary factors influencing user engagement with chatbots. Additionally, the integration of AI-driven models that process and generate human-like text into chatbots poses both breakthroughs and challenges in terms of privacy, bias, resources, and ethical issues. Chatbots in HIV prevention and care show potential; however, significant work remains in addressing associated ethical and practical concerns. The integration of large language models into chatbots is a promising future direction for their effective deployment in HIV services. Encouraging future research, collaboration among stakeholders, and bold innovative thinking will be pivotal in harnessing the full potential of chatbot interventions.

BackgroundEarly childhood is a critical phase of development. In low resource settings, monitoring this stage of development and providing appropriate and timely feedback is a challenge. Community-based service providers play a key role in promoting early childhood development in areas where government services are weak. These community-based service providers are also tasked with the collection of monitoring and evaluation data for donors and local government. Usually, collection of these data aims to provide accountability, learning, and correction leading to improvement. However, such data is rarely used beyond the accountability stage. ObjectiveThe purpose of this study was to test the feasibility and acceptability of the Information for Action (IFA) mobile phone app. The IFA app was designed for use by community health volunteers (CHVs), and repackages routinely collected data about children into useful, offline decision support for caregivers and program managers. MethodsThe IFA app was tested with a convenience sample of 10 CHVs in West Katweng’a, a sublocation of Rarieda subcounty in western Kenya. CHVs used the IFA app for 5 months as part of their regular home visits to households containing children aged 0 to 5 years, after which a qualitative assessment of the app was conducted. A total of 16 caregivers who received services from the CHVs were randomly selected to participate in 1 of 2 focus group discussions about their experience. ResultsThe app was reported to help facilitate interactive dialog between CHVs and caregivers, leading to improved quality of home visits. Caregivers described the app as shifting the relationship from feeling harassed by CHVs to experiencing genuine interest from CHVs. CHVs reported feasibility challenges primarily related to infrastructure. The limited battery life of mobile phones combined with the lack of readily available electricity made it difficult to keep the phones charged. CHVs reported initial anxiety as first-time mobile phones users, including concerns about using the IFA app. With time, increased levels of confidence were seen. ConclusionsAcceptability was high with both CHVs and caregivers, who reported an improvement in their client-provider relationship. A number of feasibility challenges were experienced.

BackgroundMost of the world’s women living with human immunodeficiency virus (HIV) reside in sub-Saharan Africa. Although efforts to reduce mother-to-child transmission are underway, obtaining complete and accurate data from rural clinical sites to track progress presents a major challenge. ObjectiveTo describe the acceptability and feasibility of mobile phones as a tool for clinic-based face-to-face data collection with pregnant women living with HIV in South Africa. MethodsAs part of a larger clinic-based trial, 16 interviewers were trained to conduct mobile phone–assisted personal interviews (MPAPI). These interviewers (participant group 1) completed the same short questionnaire based on items from the Technology Acceptance Model at 3 different time points. Questions were asked before training, after training, and 3 months after deployment to clinic facilities. In addition, before the start of the primary intervention trial in which this substudy was undertaken, 12 mothers living with HIV (MLH) took part in a focus group discussion exploring the acceptability of MPAPI (participant group 2). Finally, a sample of MLH (n=512) enrolled in the primary trial were asked to assess their experience of being interviewed by MPAPI (participant group 3). ResultsAcceptability of the method was found to be high among the 16 interviewers in group 1. Perceived usefulness was reported to be slightly higher than perceived ease of use across the 3 time points. After 3 months of field use, interviewer perceptions of both perceived ease of use and perceived usefulness were found to be higher than before training. The feasibility of conducting MPAPI interviews in this setting was found to be high. Network coverage was available in all clinics and hardware, software, cost, and secure transmission to the data center presented no significant challenges over the 21-month period. For the 12 MHL participants in group 2, anxiety about the multimedia capabilities of the phone was evident. Their concern centered on the possibility that their privacy may be invaded by interviewers using the mobile phone camera to photograph them. For participants in group 3, having the interviewer sit beside vs across from the interviewee during the MPAPI interview was received positively by 94.7% of MHL. Privacy (6.3%) and confidentiality (5.3%) concerns were low for group 3 MHL. ConclusionsMobile phones were found both to be acceptable and feasible in the collection of maternal and child health data from women living with HIV in South Africa. Trial RegistrationClinicaltrials.gov NCT00972699; http://clinicaltrials.gov/ct2/show/NCT00972699 (Archived by WebCite at http://clinicaltrials.gov/ct2/show/NCT00972699)

BackgroundThere is an increasingly urgent gap in knowledge regarding the translation of effective HIV prevention and care programming into scaled clinical policy and practice. Challenges limiting the translation of efficacious programming into national policy include the paucity of proven efficacious programs that are reasonable for clinics to implement and the difficulty in moving a successful program from research trial to scaled programming. This study aims to bridge the divide between science and practice by exploring health care providers' views on what is needed to implement new HIV programs within existing HIV care.MethodsWe conducted 20 in-depth interviews with clinic managers and clinic program implementing staff and five key informant interviews with district health managers overseeing programming in the uMgungundlovu District of KwaZulu-Natal Province, South Africa. Qualitative data were analyzed using a template approach. A priori themes were used to construct templates of relevance, including current care context for HIV and past predictors of successful implementation. Data were coded and analyzed by these templates.ResultsHeath care providers identified three main factors that impact the integration of HIV programming into general clinical care: perceived benefits, resource availability, and clear communication. The perceived benefits of HIV programs hinged on the social validation of the program by early adopters. Wide program availability and improved convenience for providers and patients increased perceived benefit. Limited staffing capacity and a shortage of space were noted as resource constraints. Programs that specifically tackled these constraints through clinic decongestion were reported as being the most successful. Clear communication with all entities involved in clinic-based programs, some of which include external partners, was noted as central to maximizing program function and provider uptake.ConclusionsAmid the COVID-19 pandemic, new programs are continuously being developed for implementation at the primary health care level. A better understanding of the factors that facilitate and prevent programmatic success will improve public health outcomes. Implementation is likely to be most successful when programs capitalize on endorsements from early adopters, tackle resource constraints, and foster greater communication among partners responsible for implementation.

Current approaches to longitudinal assessment of childrens developmental and psychological well-being, as mandated in the United Nations Sustainable Development Goals, are expensive and time consuming. Substantive understanding of global progress toward these goals will require a suite of new robust, cost-effective research tools designed to assess key developmental processes in diverse settings. While first steps have been taken toward this end through efforts such as the National Institutes of Healths Toolbox, experience-near approaches including naturalistic observation have remained too costly and time consuming to scale to the population level. This perspective presents 4 emerging technologies with high potential for advancing the field of child health and development research, namely (1) affective computing, (2) ubiquitous computing, (3) eye tracking, and (4) machine learning. By drawing attention of scientists, policy makers, investors/funders, and the media to the applications and potential risks of these emerging opportunities, we hope to inspire a fresh wave of innovation and new solutions to the global challenges faced by children and their families.

Sub-Saharan Africa has been heavily impacted by the HIV/AIDS epidemic. Social data (e.g., social media, internet search, wearable device, etc) show great promise assisting in public health and HIV surveillance. However, research on this topic has primarily focused in higher resource settings, such as the United States. It is especially important to study the prevalence and potential use of these data sources and tools in low- and middle-income countries (LMIC), such as Sub-Saharan Africa, which have been heavily impacted by the HIV epidemic, to determine the feasibility of using these technologies as surveillance and intervention tools. Accordingly, we 1) described the prevalence and characteristics of various social technologies within South Africa, 2) using Twitter, Instagram, and YouTube as a case study, analyzed the prevalence and patterns of social media use related to HIV risk in South Africa, and 3) mapped and statistically tested differences in HIV-related social media posts within regions of South Africa. Geocoded data were collected over a three-week period in 2018 (654,373 tweets, 90,410 Instagram posts and 14,133 YouTube videos with 1,121 comments). Of all tweets, 4,524 (0.7%) were found to related to HIV and AIDS. The percentage was similar for Instagram 95 (0.7%) but significantly lower for YouTube 18 (0.1%). We found regional differences in prevalence and use of social media related to HIV. We discuss the implication of data from these technologies in surveillance and interventions within South Africa and other LMICs.

Community-based HIV testing and counseling (HTC) programs have become an important part of the healthcare system in South Africa and other low- and middle-income countries with a high HIV prevalence and strained primary healthcare system. Current HTC programs excel at identifying people living with HIV (PLH) but leave gaps in linkage to care and antiretroviral therapy (ART) as most HTC programs do not have the capacity to ensure that linkage has occurred. This article presents the protocol for an mHealth study, that is, pilot testing a mobile platform in KwaZulu-Natal (KZN), South Africa, to improve linkage to care and ART adherence after home-based HTC. Testing data are shared with designated clinics. PLH are identified using fingerprint scans, mobile numbers, or South African IDs. If PLH do not present at a designated clinic after testing HIV positive, study field staff are sent SMS alerts to prompt follow-up visits. Similarly, if PLH do not refill ART prescriptions after their initial 1-month dose runs out, SMS alerts that are sent to field staff. This paper presents the mHealth study protocol and baseline sample characteristics (N = 101 PLH). Analyses will summarize rates of linkage to care and ART prescription refills. Cost-effectiveness analyses will examine the costs and benefits of linkage and ART adherence using our mHealth system. Linkage to care rates will be compared between our study and a historical control, that is, provided by a prior HTC program that was conducted in KZN without our mHealth system (n = 615).

Valid measurement of substance use is necessary to evaluate preventive and treatment interventions. Self-report is fast and inexpensive, but its accuracy can be hampered by social desirability bias and imperfect recall. We examined the agreement between self-report of recent use and rapid diagnostic tests for three substances (alcohol, cannabis, and methamphetamine) among 904 young men living in Cape Town, South Africa. Rapid diagnostic tests detected the respective substances in 32%, 52%, and 22% of men. Among those who tested positive, 61% (95% CI [56%, 66%]), 70% ([67%, 74%]), and 48% ([42%, 54%]) admitted use. Men were moderately more willing to admit use of cannabis than alcohol (log OR 0.42) or admit use of alcohol than methamphetamine (log OR 0.53). Our findings show that self-report has reasonable criterion validity in this population, but criterion validity can vary substantially depending on the substance.

Working in an interdisciplinary manner at the crossroads of alcohol and HIV research is a challenge. This paper presents six novel approaches that could be applied to activities at the intersection of alcohol and HIV. These approaches are (i) address the fact that the availability of new technology is unevenly distributed around the world, (ii) use technology to move beyond both paper and digital surveys, (iii) introduce a focus on advocacy and partnerships with large technology companies, (iv) harness technological innovation to utilise digital counselling, (v) explore the use of virtual reality in both research and delivering interventions, and (vi) consider alternative funding models to those currently in existence to improve efficiencies and innovations. Aiming to understand the interplay of alcohol and HIV will require creativity. The six approaches outlines in this paper provide possible directions from which new approaches may emerge.

mHealth has been proposed to address inefficiencies in the current South African healthcare system, including home-based HIV testing and counseling (HTC) programs. Yet wide-scale adoption of mHealth has not occurred. Even as infrastructure barriers decrease, a need to better understand perceived adoption barriers by stakeholders remains. We conducted focus group discussions (FGD) in South Africa in 2016 with 10 home-based HTC field staff, 12 community health workers (CHWs) and 10 persons living with HIV (PLH). Key informant (KI) interviews were conducted with five health officials. Perceptions about current home-based HTC practices, future mHealth systems and the use of biometrics for patient identification were discussed, recorded and transcribed for qualitative analysis. Themes were based on a conceptual model for perceived mHealth service quality. Stakeholders brought up a lack of communication in sharing patient health information between clinics, between clinics and CHWs, and between clinics and patients as major barriers to care that mHealth can address. CHWs need better patient information from clinics in terms of physical location and health status to plan visitation routes and address patient needs. CHWs perceive that communication barriers create distrust towards them by clinic staff. PLH want automated appointment and medication reminders. KI see mHealth as a way to improve health information transfer to government officials to better allocate healthcare resources. Stakeholders are also optimistic about the ability for biometrics to improve patient identification but disagreed as to which biometrics would be acceptable, especially in older patients. All stakeholders provided useful information towards the development of mHealth systems. Hospitals are adopting patient-centered approaches that solicit feedback from patients and incorporate them into decision-making processes. A similar approach is needed in the development of mHealth systems. Further, such systems are critical to the successful extension of the health system from health facilities into people's homes.

Intimate partners play an important role in chronic diseases. Despite the chronic disease burden in sub- Saharan Africa, very few culturally relevant quantitative measures of intimate relationship functioning are available. We conducted an empirical investigation evaluating the psychometric properties of the South African Relationship Functioning Assessment (SARFA) assessing healthy relationship functioning in N = 150 community members (50% women; M age = 27.2 years) living in the Vulindlela area of KwaZulu-Natal, South Africa. Item development was based on prior qualitative research from two South African communities. All assessments were conducted in isiZulu, participants' primary language. An exploratory factor analysis was conducted on the initial 39-item measure. The best-fitting model consisted of one factor with 22 items. The SARFA's internal consistency was a = .94. Convergent validity was observed via significant positive associations (all rs = .38, p < .001) between the SARFA's total score and measures of trust, emotional intimacy, constructive communication, sexual satisfaction, and relationship control (women only). Divergent validity was observed for women only. Encouraging initial psychometric properties of a culturally relevant measure of relationship functioning in KwaZulu-Natal may have relevance to other communities and potential to be used in research involving couples and health in chronic disease-burdened communities. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]