CHIPTS Policy Director Dr. Arleen Leibowitz discusses cost effectiveness analysis and outcomes in the context of HIV prevention. Click here to review her presentation. 
David Wilson
Director, Global HIV/AIDS Program
The World Bank
“The End of AIDS: The Road to Implementation”
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March 13, 2014 – Dr. Rishi Manchanda, President/Founder of HealthBegins, presented on the potential role of social determinants of health in improving the triple aim – i.e. better healthcare quality, population health outcomes, and lower costs. The presentation provided examples of how healthcare professionals, equipped with the tools, technology, and training, can engage colleagues and community stakeholders in developing care delivery interventions that address social determinants of health. Finally, it presented participatory training and “Community Health Detailing” models to describe approaches that can help healthcare systems achieve the triple aim. The presentation was given as part of the HIV Community and Research Colloquia Series hosted by the Los Angeles County (LAC) Commission on HIV and the UCLA Center for HIV Identification, Prevention, and Treatment Services (CHIPTS).
CHIPTS hosts a monthly HIV Research and Community Colloquia Series in collaboration with the Los Angeles County Commission on HIV to highlight current issues and conversations surrounding HIV. Click here for past lectures and check out the events page for more information on future Colloquia presentations!
Curious about PrEP, a prevention strategy that can reduce risk of HIV infection by up to 99 percent?
Learn more by watching, “PrEParing for HIV: An Epidemic Interventions Initiative by the University of California.” HIV/AIDS researchers at the University of California explain how pre-exposure prophylaxis works, and young men share their stories about taking a daily dose of Truvada to preserve their health.”
Stream and view slides from the Conference on Retroviruses and Opportunistic Infections (CROI) 2104 by going to http://www.croiwebcasts.org
New research from a team led by CHIPTS Policy Director and Public Policy research professor Arleen Leibowitz shows that local health jurisdictions were able to maintain HIV testing near to pre-recession levels despite a substantial reduction in funding during California’s budget 2009 crisis.
As a direct result of state budget cuts that eliminated state funding for HIV prevention and testing, the number of HIV tests administered by California’s public health agencies declined dramatically between 2009 and 2011, the researchers write in the journal Heath Affairs, The state targeted the remaining federal allocation for HIV prevention to the 15 counties (other than Los Angeles and San Francisco) with the greatest prevalence of HIV/AIDS. Counties with lower HIV/AIDS prevalence lost all their state support and saw the number of publicly funded tests plummet by 90 percent. Although testing dropped precipitously, HIV diagnoses fell by a much smaller amount. The 90 percent drop in testing in low-burden areas from 2009 to 2011 resulted in a decline in new diagnoses of only 15.7 percent in those counties. New cases of HIV/AIDS “declined by 6.7 percent in high-burden jurisdictions, despite the fact that their HIV prevention funding was halved and the numbers of HIV tests supported by public funds fell by 19 percent,” the researchers write.
The level of new diagnoses remained high because public health officials responded nimbly to the elimination of state funding, the researchers report. “By targeting the remaining federal resources to the most affected areas and allowing local jurisdictions the flexibility to allocate support to the most effective strategies and the populations at highest risk,” the state reduced the impact of the cuts, Leibowitz said.
“Across-the-board cuts would have resulted in delivering many fewer tests and identifying smaller numbers of new HIV/AIDS cases,” she added.
Although the agencies were able to mitigate the impact of the cuts, prevention activities were still reduced. Agencies were forced to scale back or eliminate risk-reduction and education programs, restructure program staffing, and seek external funding for testing and operations. In the sea of red ink, public health officials clung to a raft of testing regimens above other prevention methods.
“HIV testing is a crucial first step in identifying people living with HIV, who can then begin treatment to maintain their health,” Leibowitz said. “Treatment is also a key prevention strategy because it dramatically reduces transmission of the virus to others.” Even with the increased emphasis on testing, however, the reduced funding pool meant that “fewer than 520 Californians a year were not informed that they had been infected with HIV,” the researchers write.
Now that California’s budget outlook is improving, HIV testing should be strengthened and expanded, Leibowitz said. “California’s improved fiscal situation could allow for restoring resources for free, publicly-funded HIV testing, so necessary to the ‘HIV treatment as prevention’ strategy,” she said.
The article, “HIV Tests And New Diagnoses Declined After California Budget Cuts, But Reallocating Funds Helped Reduce Impact,” appears in the March 2014 issue of Health Affairs. Leibowitz’s coauthors are Karen Byrnes, Adriane Wynn and Kevin Farrell of UCLA’s California HIV/AIDS Policy Research Center. Support came from the UCLA Center for HIV Identification, Prevention, and Treatment Services, which is funded by a grant from the National Institute of Mental Health. The California HIV/AIDS Research Program and the UCLA AIDS Institute also sported this research.
View the briefing by clicking here:
http://www.healthaffairs.org/events/2014_03_11_hiv_aids/
http://content.healthaffairs.org/content/33/3/418.abstract
Alex Boekelheide
(“Buckle-hide”)
Executive Director, Communications
UCLA Luskin School of Public Affairs
310-206-0159
310-206-0159 desk
310-889-8275310-889-8275 mobile
Alex.Boekelheide@luskin.ucla.edu
@UCLALuskin
www.facebook.com/UCLALuskinSchool
luskin.ucla.edu
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Kathy Sanders-Phillips, Ph.D.
Professor, Department of Pediatrics
Howard University College of Medicine
George Washington University
“HIV/AIDS Risk in South Africa-Implications for Research in the U.S.”
UCLA CFAR/AIDS Institute
Special Interdisciplinary Grand Rounds
Nathalia Holt, Ph.D.
Author of, “Cured: How the Berlin Patients Defeated HIV
and Forever Changed Medical Science”
“Chasing a Cure: The Story of the Berlin Patients”
Submissions Accepted
until March 9, 2014 Midnight
To Apply Click here
Information for Protégés Applying to APA Cyber Mentors Program
APA Cyber Mentors protégés participate in a two-year, e-collaboration and distance learning mentorship program designed to prepare doctoral-level behavioral and social scientists for careers as independent researchers in the area of HIV/AIDS and health disparities among populations of color and other communities disproportionately affected by the virus. Cyber Mentors utilizes state-of-the-art e-collaboration, and distance learning technologies (e.g., social media, webinars, etc.) to assist protégés achieve three major goals:
- Develop and implement a career development plan focused on building the capacity to conduct independent research in the area of HIV/AIDS and health disparities.
- Conceptualize, draft and submit a high-quality research application to an appropriate funding mechanism.
- Establish a mutually supportive network of professional colleagues with common research interests.
The Cyber Mentors program, funded by the National Institute of Mental Health, matches early career protégés with mentors who are leaders in the field with a strong history of receiving National Institutes of Health-supported grants.
Mentoring is conducted through regular interactions over an Internet social media platform, by telephone and at face-to-face meetings. In addition to one-on-one mentoring, protégés participate in monthly, interactive, web-based seminars that address various research, methodological, ethical and administrative topics relevant to research careers in HIV/AIDS. Protégés also participate in small-group, research-development sessions every other month. These online, small-group sessions focus on the application of concepts learned in seminars to research proposals of protégés. Protégés also participate in a series of mock reviews where research proposals are reviewed, scored and discussed at length.
Protégé/mentor pairs have the opportunity to apply for up to $5,000 to support research or career development activities (e.g., preliminary data collection, attending additional conferences, etc).
For additional information click here
On January 23, 2014, UCLA CHIPTS hosted a one-day conference on the innovative use of technology for HIV prevention and care at the California Endowment in Los Angeles. This event was a collaborative activity of the Combination Prevention Core, Policy Core, and Development Core of CHIPTS. The conference was made possible by funds from the National Institute of Mental Health (MH058107) and additional support from the UCLA AIDS Institute, UCLA Center for AIDS Research, UCLA Center for Behavioral and Addiction Medicine, UCLA Interdisciplinary and Cross Campus Affairs, and Janssen Pharmaceutical Companies of Johnson & Johnson.
The purpose of the conference was to bring together researchers, representatives of technology development companies, public policymakers, HIV service providers, and members of the HIV/AIDS community to share cutting-edge research and real-world application of social media, web-based, and mobile technologies for HIV prevention and care. The conference began with opening remarks by Dr. Steve Shoptaw, Co-Director of CHIPTS, and Dr. Sean Young, a CHIPTS investigator whose research focuses on social media and mobile health technologies. The event included keynote presentation from Dr. Indu Subaiya, CEO and Co-Founder at Health 2.0, and presentations from leading experts in the field of technology-based HIV prevention and care, such as Dr. Brian Mustanski of Northwestern University, Dr. Marguerita Lightfoot of the Center for AIDS Prevention Studies at the University of California, San Francisco, Dr. Lynn Miller and Dr. Eric Rice of the University of Southern California, Dr. Nina Harawa of Charles R. Drew University, Dr. Cathy Reback of Friends Research Institute, as well as CHIPTS investigators, Dr. Dallas Swendeman and Dr. Ian Holloway.
To provide a counter-point to the scientific presentations focusing on intervention development and implementation, there was a policy panel discussion that brought together experts in health technology development, HIV service delivery and law and policy to comment on the benefits and challenges to providing technology-based HIV prevention and care. Panelists included Mr. Ramin Bastani, Founder and CEO of HULA (www.GetHula.com), Mr. Brad Sears, JD, Executive Director of the UCLA Charles R. Williams Institute, Dr. Tina Henderson, Project Manager at JWCH Institute of Los Angeles, and Ms. Risa Flynn, Program Manager for Research at the Los Angeles Gay and Lesbian Center. Each brought their individual perspectives to bear on the issue of health information security and privacy protection.
The conference ended with presentations from Dr. Susannah Allison, Program Officer at the National Institute of Mental Health (NIMH) within the Infants, Children and Adolescents Research Program in the Division of AIDS Research, and Dr. Jacqueline Lloyd, Deputy Branch Chief and Health Scientist Administrator in the Prevention Research Branch in the Division of Epidemiology, Services and Prevention Research at the National Institute on Drug Abuse (NIDA). Dr. Allison and Dr. Lloyd presented on the currently funded technology-based HIV prevention and care research, future directions and funding priorities for HIV and technology-based research at NIMH and NIDA.
The conference was attended by over 130 participants. Forty percent of the participants were staff from a community-based organization, 30% were researchers, faculty, staff, and/or student from a university/academic institution, 15% were representatives from a technology-development company, 10% were representatives from a health department or government entity, and 6% were members of the local community planning body and or consumers.
For abstracts of the conference presentations, please go here http://www.journalmtm.com/2014/volume-3-issue-1s/
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