PrEP (pre-exposure prophylaxis) for HIV prevention is highly effective and safe. PrEP works for women. The Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) estimates 468,000 U.S. women could benefit from PrEP. However, fewer Black women have been prescribed PrEP or know about PrEP than white women.
Forty percent of women access reproductive health care only, making family planning clinics a logical and efficient location for offering PrEP to women. Family planning providers are uniquely skilled to offer options within a shared decision making model. Women want to hear about PrEP from family planning providers. Prevention of sexually transmitted infections, including HIV, is a core part of providing quality family planning services.
PrEP services have been successfully implemented in a variety of family planning settings and in different ways. Even as additional training and infrastructure support are needed to fully implement PrEP in the family planning setting, PrEP clinic champions as well as PrEP user champions are emerging.
While this toolkit is focused on cisgender women, we understand that people of all genders and sexual preferences (including gay and bisexual men) receive care in family planning settings.
This Family Planning Provider PrEP Toolkit aims to support PrEP implementation based on existing tools and resources.