Hospital Blamed for HIV Stigma

posted: 30/06/2010

The recent publicity and invitation to over 500 patients cared for by a healthcare worker with HIV to have a HIV test at York Hospital has been described as “disgraceful” by one of the city’s leading academics.
 

Professor David Maughan Brown, deputy vice-chancellor of York St John University, accused NHS bosses of not caring “who they terrify” or “how severely they stigmatise people living with HIV”.
 

In a letter to The Press, York’s local paper, Prof Maughan Brown questioned the thinking behind the hospital asking 519 patients to undergo HIV tests “because they have come into contact with a hospital worker who is HIV positive”.
 

Gross over-reaction and HIV stigma
He suggested there had been “a staggeringly inappropriate over-reaction by people so fearful of the risk of litigation, however incredibly remote, that they don’t care who they terrify or how severely they stigmatise people living with HIV”. He claimed the alternative was that senior medical personnel in the UK were so ignorant about the transmission of the HIV virus that they believed it could be passed on by casual contact. “Of the two disgraceful alternatives, one can but hope it is the former,” he said.
 

Risk ‘very low’
His comments come after the paper revealed last week how 101 former hospital patients in York had received letters asking them to attend HIV testing, after being treated by a member of clinical staff who was found to have HIV. Patients were offered support, counselling and the opportunity to undergo testing, but experts said the risk of cross-infection was very low.
 

A spokesman for NHS North Yorkshire and York said it would be “inappropriate” to comment on Prof Maughan Brown’s letter, due to an injunction preventing the publication of any information which could lead to the identification of the staff member. However, the trust repeated an earlier statement that only those who had received a letter asking them to undergo testing needed to contact their hospital.
 

Not one HIV infection from any HIV+ healthcare worker
Thousands of people have been scared across the NHS over the years, but no-one has ever been found with HIV from a NHS healthcare worker. George House Trust believes this was another pointless scare, stigmatising people and HIV. Much of the advice in the cautious NHS guidelines (now 5 years old) seems to have been ignored.

York Hospital's bad record with HIV

Two years ago York Hospital lost 19 people’s HIV medical notes in the street

NHS Guidance: HIV Infected Health Care Workers: Guidance on Management and Patient Notification [July 2005]
 

Source
 

City and Guilds in HIV and AIDS

posted: 14/04/2010

Terrence Higgins Trust runs an accredited City and Guilds HIV course. The award in understanding HIV and AIDS is a formal qualification to help people improve their own knowledge of HIV to be able to talk confidently with people about HIV. The qualification

• Is for people who want to work within the HIV sector (paid or voluntary)
• Helps people challenge misunderstandings and inaccuracies
• Improves HIV knowledge and supports delivering HIV information to young people in school.

Course content

The qualification is at level 2 of the Qualifications and Credit Framework (QCF) is awarded on successful completion of three units:

• Unit 001 Transmission and Prevention of HIV (3 credits)
• Unit 002 Stigma and discrimination in HIV and AIDS (3 credits)
• Unit 003 Managing HIV and AIDS (4 credits)

Distance learning

This is a distance learning course, spread over three months and involving attendance at a training centre for two days, one at the start of the course and one at the start of month two.The distance learning course has three units with two face to face study days held in eg central Brighton and 44 hours of study time for all units.

• Day 1 Participants will attend a training centre for Induction and Introduction to Unit 001.
• Month 1 During the first month, participants will work remotely with phone support on course work. The deadline for remote learning on Unit 001 is one month after Day 1.
• Day 2 The second day of attendance at the training centre will take place shortly after completion of unit 001. Day 2 will give an introduction to Unit 002 and Unit 003.
• Months 2 and 3 The deadline for coursework for Unit 002 and Unit 003 is two months after Day 2.

Cost
The cost for ordinary customers is £350 + VAT, but for public and voluntary sector customers £250 + VAT, with the possibility of reductions in cases of hardship.
 

Next courses

• Cardiff: 13th May Day 1 and 17th June Day 2
  
• Brighton: 25th May Day 1 and 23rd June Day 2

Courses are also held in Manchester, Leeds and London - ask when the next local course is planned.

Download an application form, or email,  or ring Justin Barrett on 020 7812 1727

Past students say:
‘The course is a must do for all working in social care or sexual education, no-matter the level.’

‘I would recommend the course to anyone non-medically trained working, or hoping to work, in the field of HIV.’

African HIV Prevention Training

posted: 08/12/2009

Free training for workers delivering the National African HIV Prevention Programme (NAHIP) starts in Manchester in January (and London). The course is accredited by Open College Network (OCN). After successfully completing the course students will receive OCN or NAHIP certificates.
 

Training
There are four course units - and a total of thirteen training Mondays - from mid January to mid May.

These provide comprehensive knowledge, understanding and skills for community workers supporting African communities in HIV prevention.
 

A range of interactive learning techniques, from group work to learning from practice, will be used in all the units, giving participants a chance to share their experiences and learn from others.

NAHIP will try to identify suitable work placements needed for some course units so you can put into practice what you have learned.
 

Aims
This training programme aims to enhance knowledge, understanding and develop skills that community based HIV and AIDS service providers working with African communities need to deliver successful and effective prevention interventions in community settings.

In addition the training programme will build skills for using research-based knowledge and written NAHIP health education resources.
 

No Cost
The training is free. There is a £50 administration fee if you do not attend.
 

Training Timetable
The 200/10 training course will be provided in Manchester on Mondays from 11 January to 10 May 2010.

Make sure you tick the box for Manchester OR London.

More course information

• Unit 1: The African communities and the role of sexual health services in HIV prevention strategies Day 1 Understanding African Communities in UK Monday 11 January in Manchester
  Day 2 role of sexual health services in prevention strategies Monday 18 January in Manchester
• Unit 2: Africans living with HIV – Treatment and Prevention.
  Day 1 HIV treatments and transmission implications Monday 1 February in Manchester
  Day 2 People living with HIV and prevention Monday 8 February in Manchester
• Unit 3: Evidence based HIV prevention intervention for African communities in the UK
  4 Days Understanding HIV prevention interventions and resources
  Mondays: 22 February, 1 March, 8 March, 15 March in Manchester
• Unit 4: Designing, implementing and evaluating HIV interventions for African communities in the UK: Using research, needs assessments, data and evaluation; Planning prevention programmes; Evaluating. Mondays: 29 March, 12 April, 19 April, 26 April, 10 May in Manchester
  

Forms, details, bookings

Download the full programme & schedule  pdf
Download application form  Word
Book online here

OR email the booking form to Fletcher Phiri

OR post it to Fletcher Phiri, Naz Project, 30 Blacks Rd, London, W6 9DT
020 8741 1879

Northern contacts for more information
In Manchester: Syson Namaganda, Black Health Agency, Zion Community Resource Centre, 339 Stretford Road, Hulme, Manchester, M15 4ZY 0161 232 5386
In Leeds: Jeni Hirst, Black Health Agency, Leeds Skyline, 4th Floor, Gallery House, The Headrow, Leeds, LS1 5RD 0113 2449767
 

HIV+ Working Surgeon

posted: 14/01/2009

An HIV-positive surgeon in Israel is being allowed to continue working. He or she is taking HIV treatment and has an undetectable viral load. The Israelis have effectively issued a statement, rather like the Swiss statement we have been reporting on over the last year. Both statements are about how effective HIV treatment can reduce infectivity to close to zero.

simple precautions are enough

The Israeli Ministry of Health has decided that the surgeon with HIV who is receiving antiretroviral treatment may return to carrying out invasive surgical procedures, providing that he or she maintains an undetectable viral load, follows infection control procedures and uses two layers of surgical gloves when operating. 
 

Time for UK HIV+ healthcare workers ban to be reviewed

Healthcare workers with HIV are routinely banned from surgical procedures of any kind, even very minor ones such as stitching wounds. This affects some doctors, midwives, some nurses, dentists, and some ambulance staff, among others. 
 

The Israeli decision is increasing the pressure on bodies regulating UK and other countries' healthcare employment to review their guidance on healthcare workers with HIV engaging in exposure-prone, invasive procedures.

In the United Kingdom, for example, the General Medical Council and the General Dental Council require that HIV-positive healthcare workers desist from carrying out exposure-prone procedures – anything that involves cutting, suturing, use of needles or delivery of babies using forceps or suction, and almost all dental work, – and all healthcare workers recruited to the National Health Service who will be carrying out these types of procedures are tested for HIV. Many healthcare workers have been forced to retire or change careers as a result of the guidance, including several in the NorthWest of England.
 

The Israeli statement is the first official acknowledgement that HIV treatment reduces the risk of bloodborne HIV transmission to such low levels that a doctor, dentist, nurse or midwife can continue working.
It could help reduce stigma for people with HIV, as long as media storms about fears of HIV transmission from healthcare workers can be avoided.
 

NAM's HIV Treatment Update in August/September took a detailed look at whether healthcare workers should be allowed to carry out surgical procedures.
 

HIV is present in potentially infectious quantities in blood, semen, vaginal fluids and breastmilk and, as a result, HIV can be passed on through injecting drug use, unprotected sex, and from a mother to her baby.
 

It’s not inevitable that a person exposed to HIV will become infected with the virus. One of the factors that affects this risk is the viral load of the person with HIV. HIV treatment lowers viral load both in blood and genital fluids.
There’s recently been a lot of debate about the infectiousness of people taking HIV treatment who have an undetectable viral load.
 

Swiss doctors kick-started the debate about a year ago. In a statement, they said that a person taking HIV treatment, who’d had an undetectable viral load for at least six months, who took all their medication and who didn’t have a sexually transmitted infection, was not infectious to their heterosexual partners.
 

The current consensus seems to be that HIV treatment, and all the Swiss conditions, reduces the risk of sexual transmission, but that a small risk may still be present.
 

Full report in the USA's Morbidity and Mortality Weekly Report
Some further details are in the aidsmap report
Source