Who
are the campaign leaders and partners?
HIV. LIVE WITH IT. GET TESTED!
was first created in 1997 by the Adolescent AIDS Program at
Montefiore Medical Center in the Bronx, New York. Under the
leadership of the Adolescent Medicine HIV/AIDS Research Network
(AMHARN) -- which provides national leadership on key research,
policy and care issues facing HIV-infected youth -- the program
has been expanded to cities nationwide. Program funders include
the National Institutes of Health (NIH), HIV/AIDS Bureau of
the Health Resources and Services Administration (HRSA), and
the Congressional Black Caucus. Numerous productive partnerships
have also been forged on the local level in each of the cities
where the campaign is being implemented. Such partnerships include
those with urban media, influential youth music personalities,
city health departments, health services organizations, HIV/AIDS
services and youth organizations. Some of our key partners include:
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The Adolescent Medicine HIV/AIDS Research
Network (AMHARN)
The Adolescent Medicine HIV/AIDS Research Network (AMHARN) provides
national leadership on key research policy and care issues facing
HIV-infected youth. AMHARN brings together 20 principal investigators,
doctors and researchers at 15 sites throughout the United States.
The sites are located in 13 major cities designated as HIV epicenters.
AMHARN is a cooperative agreement between its sites linking
them with the National Institutes of Health (NICHD, NIAID, NIDA).
It sponsors the major national study of HIV infection in youth
and brings together sites that are nationally-recognized adolescent
HIV programs along with principal investigators who are leaders
in the care and research of youth with HIV. Each of the clinical
sites that make up the AMHARN network have comprehensive care
systems for HIV-infected youth, as well as community partnerships
to facilitate outreach and services for at-risk youth. The staff
at AMHARN sites include not only physicians and nurses but also
intensive social work/case management, peer educators and other
supportive staff to address the range of health and social needs
of vulnerable youth.
As the benefits for early clinical intervention in HIV infection
become clearer, the urgency for identifying and linking HIV
and youth to care heightens. AMHARN seeks to forge a continuum
from prevention, to counseling and testing, to care, and to
infuse testing and counseling information into behavioral intervention
programs targeting minority communities that are heavily impacted
by HIV/AIDS -- African-American and Latino youth represent half
of all AIDS cases and 62% of new infections among youth ages
13-24.
In 2000, AMHARN's Project ACCESS is launching HIV. LIVE WITH
IT. GET TESTED!, a five-city social marketing campaign linking
HIV counseling, testing and care targeted to at-risk youth ages
13-21 in the highly-impacted African-American and Latino communities.
AMHARN's other programs include The REACH study and Project
TREAT. Project REACH is the clinical study of the course of
HIV infection in sexually infected teens. Project TREAT is an
initiative to improve adherence to antiretroviral medicines
among teens.
The AMHARN network and Project ACCESS are chaired by Donna Futterman,
MD, Director of the Adolescent AIDS Program at Montefiore Medical
Center (Bronx, NY) and an Associate Professor of Pediatrics
at Albert Einstein College of Medicine (Bronx, NY). The sites
and principal investigators for Project ACCESS include: University
of Maryland, Department of Pediatrics, Dr. Ligia Peralta; Children's
Hospital of Los Angeles, Division of Adolescent Medicine, Dr.
Marvin Belzer; University of Miami School of Medicine, Division
of Adolescent Medicine, Dr. Lawrence Friedman; and Children's
National Medical Center, Adolescent Medicine/Burgess Clinic
in Washington, D.C., Dr. Lawrence D'Angelo.
