New York University

New York University

The Office of Public Affairs

Monday, Nov 19, 2007

N-179, 2007-2008

Katherine Hutchinson, PhD, RN, assistant professor at New York University College of Nursing, has been awarded a $1.9 million (RO1) grant from the National Institutes of Health, National Institute of Nursing Research, to develop and test a mother-daughter HIV risk-reduction program in Jamaica over the course of four years.

Dr. Hutchinson and her collaborators in Jamaica will spend the first year of the study developing a culture-specific risk-reduction intervention that will ultimately involve nearly 400 mother-daughter pairs. In subsequent years, her team will run two-day mother-daughter interventions, led by Jamaican nurses and other staff, in which the pairs gain knowledge and skills about HIV and STD prevention. Mothers will be provided with parenting skills, such as how to talk about sexual topics and teach their daughters how to protect themselves. Her study builds on past research showing that mothers can act as a key influence on teen sexual risk behavior.

“HIV and STDs are a very significant and growing problem in Jamaica, and young women are particularly at risk,” says Dr. Hutchinson. A particular concern is that young women lack both the skills and power to negotiate condom use with men, and there tends to be little discussion about issues of sexuality between mothers and daughters. “The mothers we’ve talked to did not have their own role models with whom to discuss sexuality, but now that the stakes have risen dramatically, they really want to provide this type of support to their daughters.”

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The College of Nursing at the College of Dentistry is located on New York University’s historic Greenwich Village campus in New York City. The College of Nursing is one of the leading nursing programs in the United States. The College offers a Bachelor of Science in Nursing; Master of Arts and Post-Master’s Certificate Programs; and a Doctor of Philosophy in Research Theory and Development. For more information, visit www.nyu.edu/nursing.