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Sex workers as peer health advocates: community empowerment and transformative learning through a Canadian pilot program

Overview of attention for article published in International Journal for Equity in Health, August 2017
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About this Attention Score

  • In the top 25% of all research outputs scored by Altmetric
  • High Attention Score compared to outputs of the same age (86th percentile)
  • Good Attention Score compared to outputs of the same age and source (74th percentile)

Mentioned by

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1 policy source
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17 X users
facebook
1 Facebook page

Citations

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42 Dimensions

Readers on

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188 Mendeley
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Title
Sex workers as peer health advocates: community empowerment and transformative learning through a Canadian pilot program
Published in
International Journal for Equity in Health, August 2017
DOI 10.1186/s12939-017-0655-2
Pubmed ID
Authors

Cecilia Benoit, Lynne Belle-Isle, Michaela Smith, Rachel Phillips, Leah Shumka, Chris Atchison, Mikael Jansson, Charlotte Loppie, Jackson Flagg

Abstract

Social marginalization and criminalization create health and safety risks for sex workers and reduce their access to health promotion and prevention services compared to the general population. Community empowerment-based interventions that prioritize the engagement of sex workers show promising results. Peer-to-peer interventions, wherein sex workers act as educators of their colleagues, managers, clients and romantic partners, foster community mobilization and critical consciousness among sex workers and equip them to exercise agency in their work and personal lives. A pilot peer health education program was developed and implemented, with and for sex workers in one urban centre in Canada. To explore how the training program contributed to community empowerment and transformative learning among participants, the authors conducted qualitative interviews, asked participants to keep personal journals and to fill out feedback forms after each session. Thematic analysis was conducted on these three data sources, with emerging themes identified, organized and presented in the findings. Five themes emerged from the analysis. Our findings show that the pilot program led to reduced internalized stigma and increased self-esteem in participants. Participants' critical consciousness increased concerning issues of diversity in cultural background, sexual orientation, work experiences and gender identity. Participants gained knowledge about how sex work stigma is enacted and perpetuated. They also became increasingly comfortable challenging negative judgments from others, including frontline service providers. Participants were encouraged to actively shape the training program, which fostered positive relationships and solidarity among them, as well as with colleagues in their social network and with the local sex worker organization housing the program. Resources were also mobilized within the sex worker community through skills building and knowledge acquisition. The peer education program proved successful in enhancing sex workers' community empowerment in one urban setting by increasing their knowledge about health issues, sharing information about and building confidence in accessing services, and expanding capacity to disseminate this knowledge to others. This 'proof of concept' built the foundation for a long-term initiative in this setting and has promise for other jurisdictions wishing to adapt similar programs.

X Demographics

X Demographics

The data shown below were collected from the profiles of 17 X users who shared this research output. Click here to find out more about how the information was compiled.
Mendeley readers

Mendeley readers

The data shown below were compiled from readership statistics for 188 Mendeley readers of this research output. Click here to see the associated Mendeley record.

Geographical breakdown

Country Count As %
Unknown 188 100%

Demographic breakdown

Readers by professional status Count As %
Student > Master 33 18%
Student > Ph. D. Student 22 12%
Student > Bachelor 19 10%
Researcher 16 9%
Lecturer 8 4%
Other 32 17%
Unknown 58 31%
Readers by discipline Count As %
Nursing and Health Professions 29 15%
Social Sciences 29 15%
Medicine and Dentistry 27 14%
Psychology 23 12%
Unspecified 2 1%
Other 8 4%
Unknown 70 37%
Attention Score in Context

Attention Score in Context

This research output has an Altmetric Attention Score of 15. This is our high-level measure of the quality and quantity of online attention that it has received. This Attention Score, as well as the ranking and number of research outputs shown below, was calculated when the research output was last mentioned on 01 July 2023.
All research outputs
#2,329,170
of 25,138,857 outputs
Outputs from International Journal for Equity in Health
#379
of 2,187 outputs
Outputs of similar age
#42,656
of 321,239 outputs
Outputs of similar age from International Journal for Equity in Health
#15
of 55 outputs
Altmetric has tracked 25,138,857 research outputs across all sources so far. Compared to these this one has done particularly well and is in the 90th percentile: it's in the top 10% of all research outputs ever tracked by Altmetric.
So far Altmetric has tracked 2,187 research outputs from this source. They typically receive a lot more attention than average, with a mean Attention Score of 11.4. This one has done well, scoring higher than 82% of its peers.
Older research outputs will score higher simply because they've had more time to accumulate mentions. To account for age we can compare this Altmetric Attention Score to the 321,239 tracked outputs that were published within six weeks on either side of this one in any source. This one has done well, scoring higher than 86% of its contemporaries.
We're also able to compare this research output to 55 others from the same source and published within six weeks on either side of this one. This one has gotten more attention than average, scoring higher than 74% of its contemporaries.