National Research Project Brings Game-Changing Interventions to Scale
WASHINGTON, D.C. (PRWEB) June 14, 2016 -- AIDS United and Boston University School of Public Health’s Center for Advancing Health Policy and Practice (CAHPP) have been tapped to lead a national, first-of-its-kind project to disseminate and test evidence-informed interventions to improve access to HIV care for people who face some of the largest disparities across the United States. Using an implementation-science approach, 12 sites across the country will be supported with practical tools, technical assistance and evaluation expertise to ensure successful replication of four interventions to improve patient outcomes.
Through the Dissemination of Evidence-Informed Interventions initiative, grantee organizations will implement one of four interventions focused on the needs of women of color, people who use opioids or those who are transitioning back in to the community from jail. The interventions are:
• Integrating Buprenorphine Treatment for Opioid Use Disorder in HIV Primary Care,
• Transitional Care Coordination from Jail Intake to Community HIV Primary Care,
• Enhanced Patient Navigation for Women of Color, and
• Peer Linkage and Re-engagement of HIV-Positive Women of Color.
The interventions to be implemented are based on past initiatives funded under the Health Resources Services Administration (HRSA), HIV/AIDS Bureau, Special Projects of National Significance (SPNS), created under federal legislation to help spur the development of innovative models of HIV care. This multi-year initiative, led by AIDS United and CAHPP, represents the first attempt to bring innovative SPNS-supported interventions to scale across the field.
“Approximately 1.2 million people live with HIV in this country and 45,000 newly contract the virus every year,” says Jane Fox, principal investigator at Boston University School of Public Health. “This work is critical in disseminating research findings from past HRSA/SPNS projects to other clinics looking for innovative models to engage and retain patients in HIV care and, ultimately, achieve viral suppression.”
AIDS United will provide implementation expertise and technical assistance for the 12 grantees and manage the contracting relationship and flow of resources to the sites, while CAHPP will provide evaluation-related technical assistance and spearhead dissemination findings.
“We already have the data to prove the interventions work,” says AIDS United President and CEO Michael Kaplan. “This time, instead of focusing on ‘do they work,’ we’ll be looking at how to make them as turn-key as possible to get these great evidence-informed interventions into communities across the country at the forefront of this epidemic.”
Funded sites by intervention include:
Integrating Buprenorphine Treatment for Opioid Use Disorder in HIV Primary Care
• CENTRO ARARAT, Inc., FAITH Clinic – Juana Díaz, PR
• The MetroHealth System – Cleveland, OH
• University of Kentucky Research Foundation, through the Bluegrass Care Clinic at UKHealthcare and the Center for Health Services Research– Lexington, KY
Transitional Care Coordination from Jail Intake to Community HIV Primary Care
• The Cooper Health System Early Intervention Program– Camden, NJ
• The University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill, School of Medicine, Division of Infectious Diseases– Chapel Hill, NC
• Southern Nevada Health District – Las Vegas, NV
Enhanced Patient Navigation for Women of Color
• Grady Health System, Infectious Disease Program– Atlanta, GA
• Keck School of Medicine at University of Southern California – Los Angeles, CA
• Newark Beth Israel Medical Center, a part of the RWJBarnabas Health System– Newark, NJ
Peer Linkage and Re-engagement of HIV-Positive Women of Color
• AIDS Care Group – Chester, PA
• Howard Brown Health– Chicago, IL
• Meharry Medical College– Nashville, TN
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About AIDS United:
Created by a merger between the National AIDS Fund and AIDS Action in late 2010, AIDS United’s mission is to end the AIDS epidemic in the United States, through strategic grant-making, capacity building, formative research and policy. AIDS United works to ensure access to life-saving HIV/AIDS care and prevention services and to advance sound HIV/AIDS-related policy for U.S. populations and communities most impacted by the epidemic. To learn more about AIDS United, visit: http://www.aidsunited.org.
About CAHPP:
Boston University School of Public Health's Center for Advancing Health Policy and Practice (formerly Health & Disability Working Group) is focused on building on policies and practices that improve the well-being of those who are often overlooked in the health care discussion–children and adults with special health care needs, people living with HIV and other chronic diseases, or those facing issues of substance use, mental health, and homelessness. We foster partnerships with these communities in all our work. To learn more, visit: http://www.cahpp.org.
Cody Barnett, AIDS United, http://www.aidsunited.org/AIDSWatch, +1 717-880-7100, [email protected]
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