August 27, 2001 @ 10:30 am

Agenda

Participants: Dr. Kathy Marconi, Steven Young, Deborah Parham, Dr. Betty Duke, Barbara Aranda-Naranjo, Robyn Schulhof, David Barney, Betty Duran, Dr. Joseph O’Neal, Mari, Alisa, Rosana (SY), Ken, Steve, Tony (AZ), Kari, Veronica (NM), Tony, John (El Paso), Bob, Marisa, Yolanda, Sandi (VAC), Kurt, Michael (UCB)

1. Project reports:

a. Valley AIDS Council

Outreach – Eagle Pass has begun to conduct local outreach, distributing condoms, and conducting HIV testing.

CHC HIV-patient loads include 6 at Brownsville, 2 at La Nuestra Clinica, and 6 plus 3 pending at United. VAC continues to complete data on their HIV patients. Reported that Doctor at La Nuestra Clinica has turned away 2 patients, stating these were not newly diagnosed patients. Dr. Garica will meet with the doctor to explore why the doctor would not treat a previously diagnosed patient. Bob advised a continuing issue is that the doctors want their time protected but VAC has been unsuccessful in getting this approved by the individual clinic directors. Barbara asked Bob Smith to follow-up with her about this crisis after today’s conference call. Yolanda advised she will be meeting with VAC staff next week to review local evaluation and to discuss development of protocols that may better guide medical delivery processes. Plan to conduct qualitative interviews with clients and providers. Local dissemination effort includes collaboration with John Wiebe on a presentation at the Texas/Mexico Border Health Conference. Reported that Dr. Sinclair will visit doctors in Harlingen in October. Will be conducting one year follow-up to medical training and assessment of training needs. VAC will update Dr. Sinclair on problems encountered at La Nuestra Clinica.

b. Centro de Salud Familiar La Fe

Tony advised that they are looking at acquiring the property in which their project is located. Advised that Ray Stewart has been terminated as a consultant. Kendall Carrie has resigned and project has interviewed Delia Marquez, RN to replace Kendall. Tony met with Juan Hernandez, staff person from President Fox’s office, to discuss bi-national AIDS project in Juarez, Mexico. La Fe is interested in establishing services in Juarez with support from Mexican government. Tentative commitment from Mexican government is to match La Fe dollar for dollar in funding AIDS services. Hope to establish Juarez project by next year. La Fe tested 54 persons in August, of which 8 tested HIV positive. Wiebe advised they are collecting baseline data on 160 patients.

c. Camino de Vida Center for HIV

Kari said Joao is on vacation and will not be on conference call. Stated Joao has requested to be relieved of his evaluation contract due to other personal commitments. The project staff are currently searching for a new evaluator, They are interviewing persons at New Mexico State University and contacts recommended by the NM Border Health Office. Joao has agreed to remain under contract until which time a replacement evaluator is hired and transition has been completed (includes IRB transition). Camino de Vida will begin collecting data on HIV positive clients who are already receiving primary care. They are also interested in obtaining qualitative data from clients who have entered into care with advanced AIDS diagnoses. Data instruments to be used are the multi-site modules and social support as a local module. Working with Mountain Plains AETC on developing training for CHC staff. Plan to re-administer a needs assessment survey with hopes of increasing response rate by conducting personal interviews with providers.

d. Arizona Border HIV/AIDS Care Project – Steve Trujillo

Trainings: Outreach training to Mariposa Health Center/Platicamos Salud by Enrique Gomez. Field trip scheduled for September 7^th to clubs and to introduce the promotoras to community gatekeepers.

Out Reach Activities: Yuma County – Yuma County Health Department and Puentes de Amistad are preparing outreach activities for September 16^th. Activites are planned for the weekendof the 14^th and 15^th of September in conjunction with Mexican Independence Day..

Santa Cruz County – Outreach to meet gatekeepers in Nogales Arizona/Sonora and visit to clubs (Sept. 7, 2001).

Cochise County – Cochise County Health Department (CCHD) has enrolled 1 new patient. CCHD will use their nurses, case managers and promotoras to conduct outreach. Contact has been made with Companeros, one of the promotora programs serving Cochise County. Companeros is a program of the Border Health Foundation. The CEO of the Border Health Foundation will discuss the participation of Companeros at the September 7^th collaborators meeting. Chiricahua Community Health Center (CCHC) has released their Medical Director. A meeting has been scheduled with the CEO of CCHC to discuss the recent situation. The project will continue to pursue identifying physicians in private practice to participate in the project. Dr. Carmichael will be meeting with these physicians to present the project.

ADHS Funds: Arizona Department Health Services, Judy Norton, Interim Acting Chief will attend the September 7^th collaborator meeting to provide information on the approved activities for the Congressional Black Caucus Initiative funds.

Dissemination Activities: Dr. Carmichael and Steve Trujillo presented on the project and the HRSA/SPNS border initiative at the Arizona Rural Health Conference July 24th.

Drs. Carmichael and Goldsmith presented at the 2001 Native American HIV/STD Conference in Camp Verde, Arizona, August 14^th through 16^th.

Dr. Carmichael received a letter from a patient in Yuma thanking him for consulting with Dr. Wang at Sunset Clinic on his medical condition.

Project Enrollment: Two new patients have been enrolled into the project both patients are residents of Cochise County.

Local Evaluation: Tony Estrada reported that the project has begun to enroll post SPNS patients and comparisons will be made once the “N’ for the post patients increases. Data continues to be received from collaborator sites.

e. San Ysidro Health Center

Alisa advised they have completed 167 each of the A, B, & C Modules, 40 Client Satisfaction, and 40 Quality of Life modules. Up to 1200 individual outreach contacts have been made, as well as 600 group contacts (groups consist of 10 or more persons). Mari advised they are planning on conducting end of year interviews with collaborating sites to determine if there are any problems that need to be addressed. Rosana is working on completing subcontracts with all partner sites. Site visits have been scheduled for September in which Mari, Rosana and Alisa will meet with all collaborating sites. Rosana has been invited by a bi-national AIDS agency located in Tijuana to serve on their board, she has accepted the position. Project will expand HIV testing from one day a week to full-time (40 hr week) testing. This position will be funded in part by BPC funds. Advised that HIV testing is not a priority for the San Ysidro Health Center CEO. Testing used to be offered in the OBGYN clinic, but has been placed at another location which reduces the visibility of HIV testing. Rosana is concerned this will dramatically affect the number of women being seen. The CEO has also ordered that flyers advertising HIV testing be removed. Rosana has spoken with CEO on the importance of keeping HIV testing at the OBGYN clinic at least one day a week. Barbara asked if testing would affect data collection. Mari advised that the number of persons tested would increase as a result of increased hours of testing and overall data collection would continue as previously designed. Testing has increased from 5 persons tested one day per week in January 2001 to a recent high of 5-30 persons per day. Between January and August they have identified three HIV positives. With the addition of a full-time tester, although the location of testing may change, it is anticipated that between 100-120 persons will be tested per week.

2. Multi-site evaluation issues:

a. Update on Spanish Translation of Barriers Module

-to be completed by 8/31/01

-forward to all sites for review and feed 9/06/01

- feedback due from sites by 9/14/01

-schedule conference call for final review and approval week of 9/17/01

-enter into TELEform and post on web page by 9/21/01

b. Change module – has not been developed as of yet but will draft in near future

-will document when a client case is closed or changes in client status

c. Data Entry (Tim) – duplication of submitted client files

d. Q & A Protocol (Tim) – posted on web page – review and submit any comments

e. Web Page – updated

f. Qualitative Study (Betty)

-dependent on final budget approval

- will develop study questions for review with all sites

-coordinate with sites for recruitment of participants and scheduling focus group dates

g. Site Visits – to be scheduled for October & November – projects should identify possible training and TA needs that can be handled in conjunction with site visits

h. New Participants on Conf Calls (Betty) – Request from Joe Baldi to include:

Antonio Duran – HRSA Border Health Workgroup co-chair (San Francisco)

Mr. Cantu – HRSA Border Health Workgroup co-chair (Dallas) – Grantees agreed to include these new persons on future conference calls.

3. Dissemination:

a. Guidelines for US Conference on AIDS posted on web page and e-mailed to all project directors and evaluators

b. Publications of first year activities – descriptive journal article – Barbara recommended that this be a joint (seminal) journal articles covering all projects versus individual papers. Projects were in agreement.

4. HRSA issues

Barbara advised projects that FSR (financial reports) are due on September 30, 2001. Projects should contact their project officers if they have any specific questions. Commended projects for implementation of local SPNS projects.

5. Other - None