Find the NCC on Facebook!

The National Chlamydia Coalition is now on Facebook. To follow the NCC, simply visit our page and click the "like" button. Don't forget to share it with your friends and colleagues!

An educational slide set on chlamydia, developed by the NCC Provider Education Committee, is now available for download. The slide set reviews the most recent data on chlamydia burden in the U.S. and covers chlamydia screening, treatment, and partner notification. Feel free to adapt the slide set as needed to tailor your presentation on chlamydia for your specific audience. Please share any feedback on the slide set, as well as the types of audiences and conferences for which you use it, by emailing NCC@prevent.org.

NCC and NIHCM Webinar Archived 

In case you missed it, the National Institute for Health Care Management Foundation (NIHCM) and NCC co-sponsored webinar, "Opportunities for Health Plans to Improve Chlamydia Screening", has been archived. The discussion addressed patient and provider barriers to adolescent screening and how health plans can support increased chlamydia screening among their members and by providers. Speakers included: Gail Bolan, Director of the Division of STD Prevention at CDC; Adam Atherly, Colorado School of Public Health; Eduardo Sanchez, BlueCross BlueShield of Texas; and Kathryn Armstrong from Molina HealthCare, an NCC grantee. Visit the NIHCM website to view the archived webinar and download copies of the presentations.    

Kaiser Family Foundation issued a new Women's Health Care Chartbook with findings based on a nationally representative survey of women ages 18 to 64 conducted in 2008. Findings include: only 38% of women ages 18 to 44 say that they have talked with a healthcare provider about their sexual history in the past three years; discussion of more specific topics, such as STDs (28%), HIV/AIDS (29%) and domestic or dating violence (15%) are even less frequent in the clinical setting; and 35% of these women were erroneously under the impression that STD testing was a routine part of a clinical exam.

The National Coalition of STD Directors and the National Network of STD/HIV Prevention Training Centers recently released a comprehensive summary of the CDC 2010 STD Treatment Guidelines.  

A webinar, "Focus on Adolescent Sexual Health", the second of a series of STD Treatment Guidelines webinars for health professionals, has been archived and is now available on CDC's website.

The CDC has created a website dedicated to adolescent immunization issues. The site includes information for parents, healthcare providers and for preteens and teens, plus multimedia resources such as posters, flyers, videos, Web buttons and health e-cards. An adolescent immunization scheduler can be downloaded to determine which vaccines are needed, according to the ACIP adolescent immunization schedule.  

Off the Beaten Path: Violence, Women and Art

Off the Beaten Path presents the work of 28 contemporary artists from 24 countries. The project combines cutting-edge art with important social messaging and storytelling to help create awareness, inspiration, and address systems for positive social change and action. View it online or at CDC's Global Health Odyssey Museum. 

HIV and AIDS: 30 Years Ago

The Smithsonian's National Museum of American History is marking the 30th anniversary of the emergence of what became known as the HIV and AIDS epidemic with a three-part display and website. The displays look at the public health, scientific and political responses to the pandemic, as well as how individuals and society were, and continue to be, affected.

Research Article of the Month

Chlamydia Screening Among Young Women: Individual- and Provider-Level Differences in Testing

Dr. Wiehe and colleagues from Indiana University and the Regenstrief Institute described racial and ethnic disparities in chlamydia screening of young female patients across a network of hospitals and clinics in Indianapolis, IN. The paper examines chlamydia screening practices among individual clinicians for the years 2002-2007.Individual clinicians vary substantially in the amount of screening they do. And, after accounting for variation among clinicians, individual clinicians were still somewhat more likely to screen black and Hispanic patients than white patients. For a detailed review, click here.

Gay and Bisexual Youth More Likely to Engage in Risk Behaviors

According to a new report, sexual minority students are more likely to engage in risky behaviors than other students. The report summarizes results from the Youth Risk Behavior Surveys conducted by state and local education and health agencies during 2001-2009 in seven states and six urban school districts. Gay or lesbian students, compared to their heterosexual counterparts, had a higher prevalence for behaviors in seven of the 10 risk behavior categories (behaviors that contribute to violence, behaviors related to attempted suicide, tobacco use, alcohol use, other drug use, sexual behaviors, and weight management). These same trends exist among bisexual students as well.