Translating research into practice: The dissemination and initial implementation of an evidence-based HIV prevention program

Substantial effort has gone into scientifically developing and evaluating HIV prevention interventions. These programs make only minor contributions to HIV prevention efforts until they are widely put into practice; however, little research has been conducted to study how evidence-based, community-level HIV prevention interventions diffuse from research into practice. This article explores how one such evidence-based intervention for young MSM, the Mpowerment Project (MP), is scaling up in the US. The goals of this article are threefold: (a) to describe our longitudinal study, currently underway, concerning issues regarding translating research to practice; (b) present detailed data from 69 CBOs that are implementing the MP regarding characteristics of their communities, agencies, and target populations; and (c) to present baseline data on how these agencies are attempting to implement the MP, focusing on which intervention components CBOs decided to implement, modify, or delete and the implications of these modifications.