Conference Abstract

Changing, Improving and Evaluating the Service Delivery System for People with HIV/AIDS: Strategies Used and Lessons Learned by Eight Projects. Catala, S., Dempsey, J., De Veauuse Brown, N., Wolfe, L., Driscoll M., Colgrove, J., Chase, P., Kaplan, J., Rips, J. Infrastructure-Advocacy Work Group of the Cooperative Agreement Steering Committee.

90 Minute Workshop

Category: Policy & Administration

Presentation Date & Time: 03/25/98 13:45:00

Eight national demonstration projects funded by the Special Projects of National Significance (SPNS) Program of the Health Resources and Services Administration (HRSA) have worked to develop, improve, refine, and evaluate the HIV/AIDS care and service delivery in environments best characterized as uncertain and unstable. The presentation will focus on the collective pool of project expertise, common methods used, and lessons learned by the projects participating in the HRSA SPNS Infrastructure-Advocacy Work Group. The projects, located in different rural and urban areas of the country, all strive to serve as advocates for their target populations, and empower them to fight for recognition from policy makers and those who fund HIV/AIDS services. They empower individuals living with or affected by HIV through education, training and involvement in public policy decision making processes. Additionally, the projects address the myriad of injustices suffered by people living with HIV/AIDS to ensure that social and medical services are as integrated and interconnected as are other aspects of their clients' lives. Collectively, the projects advocate for increased availability and accessibility to HIV care, including psychosocial services, increased funding for HIV research, treatment and care services, and more favorable HIV/AIDS policies. The projects develop numerous aspects of the service infrastructure for individuals with HIV and their families so that they may receive the highest levels of comprehensive, appropriate, sensitive, state-of-the-art services. Given the dynamic nature of HIV and social welfare policy, Work Group members push for programmatic change in light of policies and legislation that were not present three years ago when these projects began, such as HIV names reporting, mandatory HIV testing of pregnant women and/or newborns, and restrictive welfare, immigration and Medicaid policies. Based on their pooled findings and experiences, the Infrastructure-Advocacy Work Group projects develop blueprints for other efforts to change local HIV/AIDS services infrastructures.