Public Health Region 11 HIV STD Program
Vision Statement:
A decreased role of the public sector in the provision of services.
A changing role for the Disease Intervention Specialist away from case management and follow-up to more of a role of disease trend analysis and the design of innovative approaches toward changing the behaviors that lead to disease.
Less specialization in the area of communicable diseases and more integration of programs, people, and techniques in the approach to disease prevention.
The proliferation of truly integrated bi-national disease prevention programs.
Purpose:
The HIV/STD Program goals include health education, risk, and case reduction of congenital syphilis, female pelvic inflammatory disease, and HIV cases. Complications of gonorrhea and chlamydia may be life-threatening. The Sexually Transmitted Disease personnel counsel and test clients who may be at risk and encourage positive clients to participate in partner elicitation and contact notification. Clients who are tested for HIV and confirmed to be exposed are often notified confidentially by Sexually Transmitted Disease intervention specialists.
Activities:
- A four-day training for HIV Counselors which provides education on the current Centers for Disease Control and Prevention guidelines for effective, quality HIV counseling.
- Monitoring of agencies and community-based organizations that have been awarded contracts to provide:
- HIV counseling, testing, and treatment services.
- Risk reduction and education.
- Services to HIV-positive individuals and persons living with AIDS.
- Region 11 assists in reporting HIV infections and AIDS cases.
- Provide information/educational presentations to the general public, contractors, hospitals, private physicians, local health departments, schools, etc.
- Perform surveillance activities for the 19 counties that comprise Region 11.
- Disease Intervention Specialists interview infected individuals for partners, locate and strongly encourages partners to be tested and treated for the disease(s) to which they have been exposed.
- Maintains a syphilis case registry to provide confidential and essential diagnostic and treatment information to health care providers.
HIV/STD Program Manager