SEXUAL WELLNESS Wellness
Clinic coming to indio
On November 29, DAP Health signed a lease for a building in Indio to open a sexual wellness clinic. The organization hopes to open the new space by June 2022. Free services will include STI (sexually transmitted infections) testing and treatment (gonorrhea, chlamydia, and syphilis), HIV prevention (pre-exposure prophylaxis, or PrEP; post-exposure prophylaxis, or PEP), and HIV and hepatitis C testing. If anyone tests positive for HIV, DAP Health’s sexual wellness clinic will provide that person with rapid start medication and linkage to care, an essential step in reducing new HIV infections and improving the health outcomes of the person living with HIV. While the cost of ongoing HIV treatment is not part of the free services, DAP Health offers financial assistance. In 2019, 25% of all HIV-positive test results at DAP Health were in Hispanic men. “Many folks were driving from the East Valley to Palm Springs to utilize DAP Health’s sexual wellness services,” says C.J. Tobe, the director of Community Health and Sexual Wellness at DAP Health. “We noticed not only a high volume of patients but most of those patients were already having symptoms of an STI or testing positive for HIV.” Tobe believes free testing and treatment, with the convenience of not having to drive a great distance, will encourage more people to get tested. DAP Health is Changing the System to Meet the Person “We are proactively protecting the community’s health,” Tobe said. “Eliminating the cost barrier has proven to increase access to folks in our community for PrEP and STI services. “One of those barriers is cost. DAP Health learned many people testing positive for STIs and HIV had limited incomes. For them, the prior $25 fee for STI testing and PrEP was an impediment to care. DAP Health decided to remove that cost barrier to improve health equity.” DAP Health looks to make its services available to more people. DAP Health continues to make sexual wellness a priority by providing more people with more access to health services. It also continues to expand its ability to treat more people.
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“We welcome all people, period. And now we are eliminating more barriers to access sexual wellness services,” Tobe said. “We are changing the system to meet the person. We continue to do this, first by eliminating the cost barrier, and now by opening a free sexual wellness clinic for people most impacted by HIV/STIs. That is health equity.”
