Addressing the HIV-Related Needs of Substance Misusers in New York State: The Benefits and Barriers to Implementing a “One-Stop Shopping” Model

Abstract

Substance misusers are at risk for contracting HIV/AIDS, and substance user treatment programs (SUTPs) are uniquely situated to address their HIV-related needs. In New York State, some SUTPs have implemented a centralized model of substance user treatment and HIV care. We synthesize past literature and use data from semistructured interviews with SUTP staff, analyzed with qualitative software, to describe implementation barriers. These interviews were conducted in 2003–2004 at three SUTPs in Texas and New York as part of a study funded by the National Institutes of Health. With study limitations noted, main implications include a need for a combined medical–addiction treatment philosophy to facilitate multidisciplinary care.

Keywords :

• HIV services
• substance user treatment program
• New York State
• colocation
• staff attitudes
• treatment model

THE AUTHORS

Shiela M. Strauss, Ph.D., is Associate Professor at the College of Nursing, New York University, and Co-Director of the Statistics and Data Management Core for New York University's Colleges of Dentistry and Nursing. Her research funded by the National Institutes of Health and the Robert Wood Johnson Foundation has especially focused on the organizational response to hepatitis C virus and HIV and on optimal methodologies to collect and analyze data to understand this response.

Milton Mino, M.A., was Assistant Director of Research at New York University's College of Nursing at the time that this manuscript was developed. He has managed several large substance use and HIV-related research intervention studies, including those involving adolescents and criminal justice populations, using both quantitative and qualitative methodologies. He has authored reports aimed at scientific audiences as well as policy makers and substance user treatment providers.