Sexuality and Sexual Agency Among Heterosexual Black Men in Toronto: Tradition, Contradiction, and Emergent Possibilities in the Context of HIV and Health

This work is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution-NoDerivatives 4.0 International License.This article critically examines common understandings of sexuality and sexual agency among heterosexual Black men in Toronto. The findings are based on focus groups and in-depth interviews conducted for the qualitative arm of the broader weSpeak project, a mixed-methods study designed to engage and support heterosexual Black men in Ontario, Canada, in living more holistically healthy lives. Focus groups and in-depth interviews with 69 self-identified heterosexual Black men focused on vulnerability and resilience to HIV, but participants also shared their complex experiences and perspectives related to sexuality and sexual agency, especially in the context of systemic and structural conditions that affect their wellbeing. This article provides excerpts from their narratives to illustrate the complexities and emergent possibilities related to sexuality and sexual agency among heterosexual Black men, which may open up new ways of approaching HIV prevention and health promotion.The Canadian Institutes of Health Research (TE2-138354) and the Ontario HIV Treatment Network (1052) jointly funded the weSpeak research project through a team grant in boys’ and men’s health. Neither funder is responsible for the ideas expressed in the paper

Investigating the use of plasma pTau181 in retired contact sports athletes

BACKGROUND: Considering the wide range of outcomes following sport-related concussions, biomarkers are needed to detect underlying pathological changes. The objective was to analyze the use of plasma phosphorylated tau 181 (pTau181) as a non-invasive measure of underlying brain changes in a cohort of retired contact sports athletes at risk of neurodegeneration. METHODS: Fifty-four retired contact sport athletes and 27 healthy controls whose blood plasma was analyzed for pTau181 were included. A portion (N = 21) of retired athletes had a 2-years follow-up visit. All participants had completed a neuropsychological battery and MRI imaging. RESULTS: Plasma pTau181 was significantly higher in retired athletes compared to healthy controls (8.94 ± 5.08 pg/mL vs. 6.00 ± 2.53 pg/mL, respectively; 95% BCa CI 1.38-4.62; p = 0.02); and was significantly associated with fornix fractional anisotropy values only in the athletes group (β = - 0.002; 95% BCa CI - 0.003 to - 0.001; p = 0.002). When the retired athletes cohort was divided into high vs. normal pTau181 groups, the corpus callosum (CC) volume and white-matter integrity was significantly lower in high pTau181 compared to older healthy controls (CC volume: 1.57 ± 0.19 vs. 2.02 ± 0.32, p = 0.002; CC medial diffusivity: 0.96 ± 0.04 × 10-3 mm2/s vs. 0.90 ± 0.03 × 10-3 mm2/s, p = 0.003; CC axial diffusivity: 1.49 ± 0.04 × 10-3 mm2/s vs. 1.41 ± 0.02 × 10-3 mm2/s, p < 0.001, respectively). CONCLUSIONS: Although high plasma pTau181 levels were associated with abnormalities in CC and fornix, baseline pTau181 did not predict longitudinal changes in regional brain volumes or white-matter integrity in the athletes. pTau181 may be useful for identifying those with brain abnormalities related to repeated concussion but not for predicting progression