HIV Patient Education Hub

Watch as Drs. Sierra-Rosa and Madison discuss how people living with HIV can use their voice to become their own best advocate in HIV care – available with both English and Spanish closed captioning.

This easy-to-understand animated video will provide you with useful information to better understand HIV, its routes of transmission, and currently available prevention and treatment strategies.  Accede a este recurso en español aquí.

Ready, Set, PrEP is the very first nationwide program launched by the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services(HHS)that offers PrEP medications to prevent HIV transmission for free to individuals who qualify. The campaign brings awareness to the program’s initiatives to expand access to PrEP medications and reduce new HIV transmission in an effort to help end the HIV epidemic in the U.S.

To receive PrEP medication through the Ready, Set, PrEP program, patients must:

1. Test negative for HIV
2. Have a valid prescription for PrEP medication from your healthcare provider
3. Not have prescription drug coverage

For more information and to enroll, patients may visit www.GetYourPrEP.com or contact 855-447(HHS)-8410.

RAPID (Rapid ART Program for Individuals with an HIV Diagnosis) is a health system intervention to facilitate ART initiation as soon as possible after diagnosis by addressing structural barriers.

RAPID comprises several components:

1) a same-day appointment with an on-call HIV specialty physician or nurse practitioner and taxi vouchers for immediate transportation from the testing site to the clinic;

2) a same-day appointment that includes education efforts conducted by a prescribing health care professional regarding HIV infection, risk reduction and sexual health, and benefits of ART; an assessment for contraindications to ART; an explanation of options for a patient to decline treatment; and baseline lab work;

3) an accelerated insurance approval process;

4) pre-approved ART regimens that can be used without the results from genotyping or laboratory testing;

5) 5- day starter pack for each regimen to initiate ART provided to those without immediate insurance coverage;

6) an offer of the first dose to be given in the office with provider support;

7) and a telephone follow-up by a nurse within the first 7 days. The initial followup visit is scheduled between 1 to 7 days, depending on provider assessment.

People with HIV should take medicine to treat HIV as soon as possible to:

• Improve their own health

• Prevent transmitting HIV to other people.

HIV medicine can reduce the amount of HIV in the blood (also called viral load). HIV medicine can make the viral load so low that a test can’t detect it. This is called undetectable viral load. Having an undetectable viral load (or staying virally suppressed*) is the best thing people with HIV can do to stay healthy. If their viral load stays undetectable, they have effectively no risk of transmitting HIV to an HIV-negative partner through sex.