266317 Positive Pathways: Building a network of community health workers to complement conventional medical and outreach strategies to address HIV in the District of Columbia

Monday, October 29, 2012

Abby Charles, MPH , The Institute for Public Health Innovation, CommonHealth ACTION, Washington, DC
Positive Pathways is an evidence-based structural intervention by the Washington AIDS Partnership which assists HIV-positive African Americans living in Washington, DC to participate in HIV medical care with a particular focus on women and their partners.

Through a network of 12 trained peer Community Health Workers (CHWs) placed in community and primary care settings in Wards 5, 6, 7 and 8, wards that have high prevalence of HIV/AIDS, Positive Pathways works to identify out-of-care individuals and support them to enter and navigate HIV medical care and service systems until they become fully engaged in their care. The model is designed with an understanding that to affect engagement in HIV care, interventions must acknowledge and help address underlying social factors, which peers are well-positioned to do through perspective transformation and building trust-based linkages to non-medical community resources.

With a comprehensive initial training program through the University of DC Community College and ongoing training and support throughout the initiative, Positive Pathways CHWs are equipped with the skills to serve on multi-disciplinary clinical and community based teams. Over the course of the first six months of implementation, CHWs have enrolled over 200 individuals into the program of which 70% are women.

Aspects of the Positive Pathways intervention can be tailored to meet the access to care and prevention needs of diverse demographic groups and communities and to address various diseases that are prevalent in communities with the least access to healthcare.

Learning Areas:
Implementation of health education strategies, interventions and programs
Systems thinking models (conceptual and theoretical models), applications related to public health

Learning Objectives:
Describe components of the Positive Pathways peer-based intervention model Explain how Community Health Workers facilitate access to care for people living with HIV in urban settings Discuss the benefits and challenges of the systemized use of peers to affect access to HIV care in a community

Keywords: Community Health Programs, HIV/AIDS

Presenting author's disclosure statement:

Qualified on the content I am responsible for because: I have worked as the Program Manager for Positive Pathways since the project inception in March, 2011. Over the course of my career I have coordinated multiple peer-driven community based initiatives to affect HIV prevention and care in the District of Columbia. I have experience and interest in designing peer programs to enhance health care access and delivery and improve health outcomes in all communities.
Any relevant financial relationships? No

I agree to comply with the American Public Health Association Conflict of Interest and Commercial Support Guidelines, and to disclose to the participants any off-label or experimental uses of a commercial product or service discussed in my presentation.