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Topic Name: Brown Researchers have created a first-ever educational video on rapid HIV testing
Category: BioFuels
Research persons: Roland Merchant
Location: Brown University, United States
Details
Researchers at The Warren Alpert
Medical School of Brown University have created the first educational video
for patients to explain rapid tests for HIV,
a relatively new tool in the fight against the AIDS epidemic.
The video gives an overview of rapid HIV tests, which can be
administered simply with a saliva swab, a finger stick or a blood draw. Results
are available in minutes. Brown researchers created the video to give health
care providers and outreach workers an effective, efficient way to educate their
patients about HIV and rapid HIV testing.
Conventional HIV tests require days of waiting for laboratory
results, which is a barrier to testing. The federal Centers
for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) reports that many patients don’t
even return for their results: 30 percent who tested HIV-positive and 39 percent
who tested HIV-negative in 2000.
In September 2006, the CDC recommended routine, universal HIV
screening in all health care settings. The new guidelines reaffirmed the use of
pre-test information to educate patients about HIV and HIV testing. Brown
researchers wanted to see whether a video would help streamline the testing
process and, ultimately, boost the numbers of patients getting tested for the
virus.
“With HIV, testing is key: If you don’t know you have the
virus, you won’t protect others or get treatment for yourself,” said Roland
Merchant, M.D., an assistant professor of emergency medicine and community
health at Alpert Medical School and an attending physician at Rhode Island
Hospital. “The power of rapid HIV testing is that results can be determined in
a single healthcare visit. With rapid tests, prevention and treatment don’t
have to wait.”
Merchant wrote and produced the video, titled Do You Know About
Rapid HIV Testing?, with colleagues at Brown and the Harvard School for
Public Health. Abbott Diagnostics Inc., which distributes OraQuick – a rapid
HIV test approved by the federal Food and Drug Administration – paid for a
portion of the production costs.
Merchant and his team created the 10-minute video for maximum
impact. It is animated and jargon-free so that as many adults as possible can
understand the explanation of HIV, how it is spread, and how the OraQuick test
works. The free
video is available on the Brown University AIDS Program Web site so that any
HIV test provider can download it to share with patients, who can watch it on a
waiting room television or on a laptop or handheld computer. The video can be
shown to individuals or groups in any testing setting, from an outreach clinic
to an emergency department.
Merchant and his team also tested the video’s effectiveness in
two randomized, controlled pilot trials. In an article published in BioMed
Central, the peer-reviewed, open-access publishing house, Brown and Harvard
researchers compare how well emergency department patients comprehended rapid
HIV pre-test information using different information delivery methods.
In the first trial of 73 patients, some received no testing
information while others received HIV pre-test information from an HIV
counselor. In the second trial, also conducted in the Rhode Island Hospital
emergency department, 120 patients either watched the video or got pre-test
information from a counselor. All patients were then given a questionnaire to
test their understanding of the pre-test information.
Researchers found that patients who watched the video
demonstrated as good or better comprehension of rapid HIV testing fundamentals
than patients assigned to the counseling group.
Merchant said a larger trial is underway. But based on these
preliminary results, Merchant said the video could be an effective substitute
for in-person HIV discussions. California’s Office of AIDS is planning to use
a modified version of the video in its testing programs.
“The video could be particularly helpful in busy,
resource-strapped testing settings, where there are a limited number of
counselors,” Merchant said.
Note for Saliva
Saliva is the watery and usually frothy substance produced in the mouths of humans and most other animals. Saliva is produced in and secreted from the salivary glands.
Some swifts use their gummy saliva in the construction of their nests. In the case of some Aerodramus swiftlets, the nests are made only from saliva, and are collected to make the delicacy bird's nest soup.
The digestive functions of saliva include moistening food, and helping to create a food bolus, so it can be swallowed easily. Saliva contains the enzyme amylase that breaks some starches down into maltose and dextrin. Thus, digestion of food occurs within the mouth, even before food reaches the stomach. Salivary glands also secrete enzyme to start fat digestion.
The CDC and the National
Institute for Allergy and Infectious Diseases sponsored the research.
Members of the Brown research team include Erin Gee, a former
undergraduate student, Melissa Clark, an associate professor of community
health, and Kenneth Mayer, M.D., a professor of medicine and community health.
At the Harvard School of Public Health, George Seage III, an associate professor
of epidemiology, and Victor DeGruttola, a professor of biostatistics, also took
part in the work.
Brown University has a fiber link television studio available
for domestic and international live and taped interviews and maintains an ISDN
line for radio interviews.
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