HIV/AIDS and Aging

In the AIDS Library

Materials focusing primarily on aging

• Aging with HIV: A Gay Man’s Guide, by James Masten
• Aging with HIV: Psychological, Social, and Health Issues, by Janice E. Nichols et al
• What People Over 50 Need to Know About HIV and AIDS, by the PA Department of Health – a pamphlet, available in both English and Spanish
• The New Ourselves, Growing Older: Women Aging with Knowledge and Power,  by Doress-Worters and Paula Brown – part of the Our Bodies, Ourselves series
• Nutrition in Aging, by Eleanor D. Schlenker

Materials with sections focusing on aging:

• The Alternative Health & Medicine Encyclopedia, by James E. Marti – with a chapter called “Aging”
• Doctor, What Should I Eat?, by Isadore Rosenfeld, M.D. – with a section called “Aging: No One Lives Forever – But It’s Worth a Try”
• Extended Health Care At Home: A Complete and Practical Guide, by Evelyn M. Baulch – with a section “Care for the Elderly”
• The Gay Men’s Wellness Guide, by Robert E. Penn – with chapters called “Older Gay Men,” and “Aging”
• Natural Family Doctor: The Comprehensive Self-Help Guide to Health and Natural Medicine, by Dr. Andrew Stanway et al – with a section of “The later years” and “Death and bereavement”
• Our Bodies, Ourselves, by the Boston Women’s Health Book Collective – with a sections on “Midlife and Menopause” and “Our Later Years”
• The Planned Parenthood Women’s Health Encyclopedia, by Planned Parenthood – with an entry on “Aging” and entries on many other issues related to Aging
• The Women’s Complete Wellness Book, by Debra R. Judelson, M.D., and Diana L. Dell, M.D. – with chapters called “Mature Years: Ages 46 to 64” and “Older Years: Ages 65 and Over”

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The Basics

For a brief introduction to this issue, see AIDS InfoNet’s Older People and HIV.

For a longer introduction, see:

• The AIDS Community Research Initiative of America (ACRIA)’s HIV and Older Adults and Preventing HIV in Older Adults booklets, available in both English and Spanish
• Positively Aware’s issue Aging with HIV: You’re Getting Older and Better

For a statistical introductions, see

• The Centers for Disease Control and Prevention’s webpage on HIV/AIDS in Persons Aged 50 and Older – for basic statistics
• GMHC’s Growing Older With the Epidemic – for more detailed epidemiological trends and policy recommendations

For a comprehensive patient handout, see the HIV Training and Resource Initiative’s Coming of Age: A Guide to Aging Well With HIV, a 68-page booklet filled with clear explanations of the aspects of medical care and practical advice for staying health.

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Specific Issues

For considerations of HIV risk among older folks (and people having sex with them), see:

• Older Adults and HIV Risk, a paper by a University of Illinois social work professor
• The British non-profit NAM’s Having Older Sexual Partners Increases HIV Risk for Younger Gay Men

For safer sex / prevention messages aimed at older adults, especially those at high risk, see:

• ACRIA and GMHC’s Still Got It at Sevety: Sexuality, Aging, and HIV
• Services & Advocacy for GLBT Elders’s Ten Things Every LGBT Older Adult Should Know About HIV/AIDS
• The National Resource Center on LGBT Aging’s An HIV/AIDS Trainer’s Perspective – for tips on talking with older adults about HIV/AIDS
• ACRIA’s collection of Palm Cards and Posters About HIV Testing for Older Adults, available in English, Spanish, Russian, Haitian Creole, and Chinese.
• The AIDS Institute’s webpage for National HIV/AIDS and Aging Awareness Day  (NHAAD, September 18^th), which includes a toolkit (at the bottom of the page), including posters, brochures, and PowerPoint presentations

For more on the way HIV can effect aging, see

• ACRIA and GMHC’s Aging Before Your Time? – with a rundown of common manifestations of again and the way that HIV effects many of these issues
• The Black AIDS Institute’s Living Longer with HIV/AIDS Includes Developing Chronic Diseases
• Science Daily’s Premature Aging Caused by Some HIV Drugs
• Medscape Medical News’s HIV Speeds Brain Aging

For a couple other specific issues around living with HIV in older age, see:

• The Well Project’s Menopause and HIV
• AIDSMeds.com’s Exercises Guidelines Published for People with HIV Over 50

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News & Personal Accounts

For recent news or magazine stories on this issue, see

• American Medical Care’s HIV in Primary Care: Treating an Aging Epidemic
• The Huffington Post’s Aging & HIV: The New Face of HIV
• New York Magazine’s Another Kind of AIDS Crisis
• NPR’s AIDS Patients Now Living Longer, But Aging Faster

For personal accounts, see

• ACRIA’s Let’s Face It: Older Adults Speak About HIV – a booklet with twelve personal stories, available in both English and Spanish
• Aging with HIV – a blog by James Masten, a Therapist and Social Work professor, which includes both professional opinions and personal opinions as someone working in the field for over 20 years.
• AARP’s Meet 6 unforgettable people over 50 living with HIV
• Helena Bushong: In Her Own Words – the story of an HIV+ older transwoman
• How to Age with HIV – Gracefully, a personal narrative from POZ magazine
• The Graying of AIDS, a photo series with personal narratives

For video personal accounts, see:

• Aging POZitively – a 35-minute video profiling three older HIV+ adults
• AARP’s Standing Up to Stigma – an article and 6-minute video profiling a retired doctor who was kicked out of an assisted living facility because of his HIV status
• The Graying of AIDS – the website of a documentary currently in progress, with dozens of interviews

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Info for Providers

For longer introductions about HIV/AIDS and aging aimed at providers:

• Achieve Magazine published an entire issue in 2009 called Growing Older with HIV
• ACRIA published a report called Research on Older Adults with HIV
• The U.S. Administration on Aging hosted a webinar in June of 2011 aimed at providers called Positive Aging: HIV Turns 30

For clinical research on HIV/AIDS and aging, see:

• University of California, San Francisco’s HIV InSite’s pages HIV and Aging: A Paradigm Shift in the Management of HIV Disease, a narrated slideshow, and HIV and Aging: Related Resources, an aggregation of journal articles, conference reports, provider education modules, and more
• ACRIA’s HIV & Aging Research: A Roadmap for the Future
• The University of Michigan’s Center for the Demography of Aging’s Research Network on HIV/AIDS and the Elderly – for research around the world
• The Body’s Updates from the First International Workshop on HIV & Aging
• Critical Interventions in Aging’s article on Religion, Spirituality, and Older Adults With HIV: Critical Personal and Social Resources For An Aging Epidemic
• The Body’s Aging & HIV/AIDS: Research page – which collects dozens more studies and reports on the topic

For an educational video aimed at providers, see the AIDS Education & Training Center’s HIV and Older Adults, a 28-minute video about co-morbities, treatment, psychosocial issues, the importance of testing older adults, and more.

Clinical Trials

About Clinical Trials

For a brief introduction to clinical trials, see AIDS InfoNet’s Participating in a Clinical Trial and How HIV Drugs Get Approved.

For a video introduction, see Clinical Trials Part 1 and Part 2 from the AIDS Library’s YouTube page (created and narrated by Val Sowell for Frontline TEACH!).

To better understand clinical trials, the National Institutes of Health (NIH) publishes a lot of useful Background Information, including:

• Understanding Clinical Trials
• A Glossary of Clinical Trials Terms

For news about clinical trials, see the NIH’s Clinical Trials News page and their What’s New page, with updates of recently added or modified studies.

To learn more about the major organizations sponsoring HIV clinical trials, see the University of California San Francisco’s HIV Research Groups and Organizations webpage.

To see a map of federal HIV/AIDS research centers, with links to each hosting organization’s website, see the National Institute of Allergy and Infectious Diseases’s Centers for AIDS Research (CFAR) map.

For a brief history of clinical trials (not HIV-specific) see the Canadian Medical Association’s A Short History of the Clinical Trial.

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How to Get Involved in Clinical Trials

People considering joining a clinical trial, may want to first read the AIDS Community Research Initiative of America’s Should I Join a Clinical Trial?

For a longer consideration of these issues, see the San Francisco AIDS Foundation’s A Guide to Clinical Trials, Part 1 and Part 2.

To find out about current clinical trials, and to learn how to participate in these trials, see the NIH’s webpages:

• Search for HIV/AIDS Clinical Trials
• ClinicalTrials.gov – not HIV-specific

At both sites, you can customize your search based on age, population, type and stage of research and more.  At the ClinicalTrials.gov site, there is a Map of All Studies   where you can browse where clinical trials are taken place all over the country and the world.

The NIH also publishes Animated Tutorials on how to search for clinical trials.

The Body.com also collects several other clinical trial databases, at their webpage on Open Clinical Trials.

Anyone participating in a clinical trial must sign informed consent documents.  For more on informed consent, see:

• The National Cancer Institute’s A Guide to Understanding Informed Consent – not HIV-focused, but relevant and more readable than the next two links
• The U.S. Department of Health & Human Services Informed Consent FAQs
• The FDA’s Guide to Informed Consent – Information Sheet: Guidance for Institutional Review Boards and Clinical Investigators – aimed at researchers not participants, but useful if you want to know what expectations the researchers have for themselves

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Concerns About Clinical Trials

Clinical trials are medical experiments on humans, so there is reason for folks to be concerned about them.  For government statements about clinical trial concerns, see the FDA’s page on Participating in Clinical Trials, including information on:

• Clinical Trials of Medical Treatments: Why Volunteer?
• Informed Consent Regulations
• Role of HIV Drug Resistance Testing in Antiretroviral Drug Development

For more information on the ethical concerns about HIV clinical trials and about experimenting on humans, see:

• The World Health Organization’s Ethical issues raised by the HIV/AIDS epidemic
• The NIH’s Office of Human Subjects Research Regulations and Ethical Guidelines and Information Sheets and Forms
• The University of California San Francisco’s Ethical Dimensions of HIV/AIDS: Research Ethics (with full citations to scholarly articles about this subject)
• The University of Pennsylvania’s Center for Bioethics webpage Logistical and Ethical Considerations in HIV Vaccine Clinical Trials

A lot of concern about human experimentation comes from the history of the Tuskegee Syphilis Study.  To learn about that study see:

• The U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention’s U.S. Public Health Service Syphilis Study at Tuskegee
• National Public Radio’s Remembering Tuskegee
• The Body Positive’s The Legacy of Tuskegee: AIDS and African-Americans
• The National Academy of Engineering’s Tuskegee Syphilis Study case study
• The book Bad Blood by James H. Jones, a history of the study, available in the AIDS Library!

How Risky Is It?

This installment of my reference series is narrower in scope than recent installments like Discharge Planning and Reentry, HIV/AIDS Education, and Trangender Resources.  But it deals with a tricky line of question that the AIDS Library sometimes gets: “How likely is [some behavior] to transmit HIV?”

This question is tricky for a few reasons.  First, people often ask for a percentage of risk for some sexual act, but in reality a number like that can’t be calculated (and anyway the risk is defined by more than just the specific act).  Second, we want to encourage caution in the face of HIV, but we don’t want HIV-negative folks to fear HIV-positive folks.  Third, we know that the safest choice is usually total abstinence from risky behavior, but if we believe in harm reduction we want to give individuals answers that “meet them where they’re at,” not answers that preach things that won’t work for everyone.  As a result of all these issues we have the potential for confusion and mixed messages when many clients just want to hear “yes, that’s risky” or “no, that isn’t risky.”

So the information below collects resources to help craft good answers to these how-risky-is-it questions.

 

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Explaining Why Risk Statistics Aren’t Precise

As with so many topics, AIDS Info Net gives a clearly written introduction, How Risky Is It?, which includes a section explaining “What the Numbers Mean,” explaining that “these calculations only give a general idea of risk.”

Go Ask Alice, the Columbia Health Services excellent health Q&A site has a good response to someone Confused About HIV Transmission Statistics, which does a good job of explaining why transmission statistics are imprecise, what some of the factors that make a single sexual act more or less risky, and that the virus doesn’t “jump over to the other side” as soon as it gets a chance.

For those more interested in academic epidemiology, the University of California San Francisco’s HIV InSite hosted an interesting roundtable discussion on The Risk of HIV Infection Through Receptive Oral Sex, with full transcript online.  In addition to covering receptive oral sex risk, the researchers discuss the many challenges (even more than I listed above!) to quantifying infection risk.

 

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Estimates of Risk by Behavior

HIV InSite has a page listing Safer-Sex Methods, sorted by No-Risk, Extremely Low-Risk, Low-Risk, and High-Risk Practices.

HIV Insite also publishes, in somewhat technical language, the HIV Risks Associated with Specific Sexual Practices, broken down to:

• Penile-Vaginal Sex
• Penile-Anal Sex
• Rectal Douching and Rectal Fisting
• Oral-Penile Sex
• Oral-Vaginal Sex
• Oral-Anal Sex

HIV InSite also fully footnotes the studies and research that their text is based on, for those who want to go deeper in to the research about risk behavior.

For a wider range of behaviors, The Body archives the questions it answers about HIV Risks From The Body’s “Ask the Experts” Forums, and break the questions down by topics:

• Anal Intercourse
• Anal-Oral Contact (Rimming)
• Bestiality
• Blood Test
• Docking
• Fingering
• Fisting
• Frottage
• Kissing
• Lap Dance
• Masturbation
• Menstruation
• Oral Sex
• Sex Toys
• Transgender
• Vaginal Intercourse
• Vomit
• Watersports (Urine)

 

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Specific Risk Issues

STIs – The likelihood of HIV transmission is increased by the presence of other sexually transmitted infections.  The CDC has a webpage, The Role of STD Detection and Treatment in HIV Prevention, which explains this.  The page also includes a link to All Their STD Fact Sheets.

Condoms – Some questions about possible risk turn out to be questions about condoms effectiveness.  Here are some sources of information about this issue:

• The CDC on Condom Effectiveness, including brief summaries on how effectiveness is studied
• Advocates for Youth on Condom Effectiveness, with more detail about effectiveness studies, including references to the academic articles on condom effectiveness
• Catholics for Choice: Do Condoms Prevent AIDS, a pro-condom article written by and for Catholics attempting to reconcile safer sex with their Church hierarchy’s opposition to any birth control.

Antiretroviral Therapy – If an HIV-positive person is in treatment, they are less likely to be able to transmit the virus to someone else. This may of particular interest to people in serodiscordant relationships (where one person is positive and the other negative).  A few resources on this topic:

• The CDC’s has a report explaining the science behind this and some of the statistical estimates, Effect of Antiretroviral Therapy on Risk of Sexual Transmission of HIV Infection and Superinfection.
• AVERT has a more readable HIV Transmission and Antiretroviral Therapy Briefing Sheet.

• And for those who really want to go deep into the science involved, several researchers have published a 44-page text that can be downloaded free, Antiretroviral Therapy for Prevention of HIV Transmission in HIV-discordant Couples.

Circumcision – Male circumcision significantly reduces the risk of HIV acquisition by men during penile-vaginal sex.

• The CDC has a page on Male Circumcision and Risk for HIV Transmission that explains this, but is a bit technical.
• This AVERT page covers the issue in a more readable manner.
• This Scientific American article offers an interesting report on the research on this issue, which is somewhat controversial.

Unknown HIV Status – The CDC estimates that 21% of HIV-positive people aren’t aware of their infection (others have put this number even higher).  That CDC report is very technical, however, so try this NPR story for a clear explanation of the 21% statistic.

Injection Drug Use – Sharing needles is a major method of transmitting HIV, but by definition no statistics exist for just how risky any individual injection is.  Here are a few useful resources on IDU risk:

• This Lancet study, which estimates that 16% of injection drug users are HIV positive
• The CDC’s National Prevention Information Network’s Injection Drug Users / Substance Abusers collection, which aggregated articles and research on IDU and HIV/STI risk
• AVERT’s Injecting Drugs, Drug Users, HIV & AIDS page, which puts IDU risk in context

Risk Non-Issues – For the people who want to know how risky it is to play contact sports or get bitten by mosquitoes, refer to the CDC’s HIV Transmission page and AIDS InfoNet’s HIV Myths & Misunderstandings page, which give nice clear NOs to some questions that still come up after all these years.

The 2011 Discharge Planning Manual

Announcing The 2011 Discharge Planning Manual (DPM).  You may have seen copies at the Prison Summit during AIDS Education Month.  The DPM was created to supplement the AIDS Library’s ongoing prisoner correspondence program.  We reply to letters from prisoners with questions about HIV/AIDS, other health issues, reentry resources, and more.  Last year we answered 747 letters!  If you know someone incarcerated, please put them in touch with us and we can mail them vital information.

A note about who the DPM is for: The DPM contains general advice on reentry and specific resources for individuals coming out of prison to Philadelphia and the surrounding area.  It also contains an introduction to HIV/AIDS, tips for HIV-positive people being released from prison, and a medical summary form intended to help HIV-positive people maintain consistent care during their reentry.  As  such, the ideal audience for the DPM is an HIV-positive person returning to Philadelphia, but it contains content that would be of use to someone who is HIV-negative and returning to Philadelphia, or something who is HIV-positive and returning elsewhere.

Below you’ll see how to get a copy of the DPM, a list of prison & reentry resources available in the AIDS Library, a collection of links to the web presences of Philadelphia reentry organizations, and a variety of web resources around reentry.  If you have any questions about the information here, or about anything else, let me know.

 

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How to Get the 2011 Discharge Planning Manual

The DPM can be accessed at The Discharge Planning Manual page of the Library’s website.  You can open it up and print it. Please also check out the Library’s Publications page to access our Resource Guide and other Library publications.

If you would like a DPM in booklet form, they are available in the AIDS Library or at FIGHT’s reentry program, the Institute for Community Justice.  We can mail a copy to anyone who requests one, as well as answer questions about discharge planning to the best of our ability.  Please contact the AIDS Library by phone (215-985-4851) or email (library@aidslibrary.org) to request a copy.

 

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Prison & Reentry Resources in the AIDS Library

The following materials are available in the AIDS Library.  Come check us out!  (See our hours.)

• Putting the Bars Behind You: Instructor’s Resource Manual – by Ronald C. Mendlin & Marc Polonsky
• Networking & Interviewing for Jobs (from the Putting the Bars Behind You series) – by Ronald C. Mendlin & Marc Polonsky
• But They All Come Back: Facing the Challenges of Prisoner Reentry – by Jeremy Travis
• When Prisoners Come Home: Parole and Prisoner Reentry – by Joan Persilia
• The Job-Loss Recovery Guide: A Proven Program for Getting Back to Work Fast! – by Lynn Joseph
• Best Resumes & Letters for Ex-Offenders – by Wendy S. Enelow and Ronald L. Krannich
• Job Hunting Tips for People with Hot and Not-So-Hot Backgrounds: 150 Smart Tips That Can Change Your Life – by Ron and Caryl Krannich
• Resume, Application, and Letter Tips for People with Hot and Not-So-Hot Backgrounds: 185 Tips for Landing the Perfect Job – by Ron and Caryl Krannich
• Reentry Today: Programs, Problems, and Solutions – by the American Correctional Institution
• Behind Bars: Surviving Prison – by Jeffrey Ian Ross & Stephen C. Richards
• Celling America’s Soul: Torture and Transformation in Our Prisons and Why We Should Care – by Judith Trustone
• The Dhamma Brothers: East Meets West in the Deep South – a film about “an overcrowded maximum-security prison in Alabama, dramatically changed by the influence of an ancient meditation program”

 

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Reentry in Philadelphia

The DPM covers all major reentry service providers in Philadelphia in more detail than I’ll go in to in this email.  For quick reference, though, here are the websites of some useful organizations.  More information, programming, and contact info can be found at each website.

• Philadelphia FIGHT’s Institute for Community Justice
• PA Prison Society’s Reentry Services
• Kingdom Care Reentry Network
• R.I.S.E – The Mayor’s Office of Reintegration Services for Ex-Offenders
• Reconstruction, Inc.
• JEVS Program for Offenders
• Impact Services Corp. Reentry Services
• X-Offenders for Community Empowerment
• Turning the TIDE

In previous Reference Librarian blog posts I’ve covered two topics central to reentry.  Take a look at them for much more info on Job Training and Recovery (including how to get in to Drug & Alcohol Recovery programs).

And for the resources and info about a third important reentry piece, check out the AIDS Library’s Housing Guide.

 

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Online Resources on Reentry

Some of these resources are aimed at the people being released.  Some are aimed at those creating programs for those people.  Some could be used by both populations.

The National H.I.R.E. Network has a website with a lot of information, including:

• Fact sheets and FAQs on Criminal Records and Employment
• A survey of Model Practice to Promote the Employment of People With Criminal Records
• Advice on Completing Employment Applications with a Criminal Record
• A selection of Employer Resources, encouraging employers to hire formerly incarcerated people

The National Institute of Corrections collects a lot of useful publications on its Offender Employment webpage, including:

• a Job-Hunting Guide for People With Less-Than-Ideal Backgrounds
• an Employment Information Handbook

Public/Private Ventures has a webpage of Reentry Publications that can be downloaded freely online, including:

• Mentoring Former Prisoners: A Guide for Reentry Programs
• From Options to Action: A Roadmap for City Leaders to Connect Formerly Incarcerated Individuals to Work
• Going to Work with a Criminal Record: Lessons from the Fathers at Work Initiative

The Legal Action Center has a lot of great content including:

• A useful summary of legal roadblocks called “What’s the Law”, searchable by subject (Parenting, Public Assistance, Voting, etc.) and by state.  Here’s a direct link to the Pennsylvania State Profile.
• A collection of Advocacy Toolkits to Combat Legal Barriers for Individuals Leaving Prisons and Jails (toolkits, that is, for people combating policies, not for people getting their individual needs met)
• The issue-by-issue, state-by-state (and federal) data is also analyzed in a 2009 report After Prison: Roadblocks to Reentry.

The U.S. Department of Justice Reentry website has:

• Local Reentry Resources by state
• Publications of Reentry Research sorted by topics like Health, Housing, Substance Abuse

The Council of State Governments Justice Center Reentry Policy Council website has:

• An online Reentry Policy Newsletter
• Reports on Succesful Reentry Programs around the country
• A wepage collecting Reentry Policy Publications on a wide range of issues

The National Reentry Resource Center has:

• Information about the 2008 Second Chance Act
• Collections of popular and scholarly articles, broken down by Reentry Topic, including Employment, Housing, Substance Abuse, Juveniles, and more

The Urban Institute has a webpage collecting some Reentry Research papers, including a report on Partnering With Jails to Improve Reentry: A Guidebook for Community-Based Organizations

The PBS series Frontline has a documentary called The Released that can be watched online.  It focuses on reentry and the cycle of recidivism among people with mental illnesses.

HIV/AIDS Education Resources

June is AIDS Education month!  Here are resources, including many freely available curricula and lesson-plans, that you can use to educate about HIV/AIDS in June or any time of the year.

Click here to learn more about Philadelphia FIGHT’s activities for AIDS Education Month 2011!

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IN THE AIDS LIBRARY

Here are some titles we have in the library that could help an educator create an HIV/AIDS education class or program.

• 52 ways to create an AIDS-free world, Donald E. Messer.
• The AIDS Awareness Library series: Myths and Facts About AIDS, What You Can Do About AIDS, and Heroes Against AIDS, Anna Forbes.
• The Complete HIV/AIDS Teaching Kit, Josefina J. Card et al.
• HIV/AIDS: A Very Short Introduction, Alan Whiteside.
• HIV Prevention Among Drug Users: A Resource Book for Community Planners & Program Managers, Academy for Educational Development.
• The Inside Story on AIDS: Experts Answer Your Questions, Seth C. Kalichman.
• Our Stories Our Songs: African Children Talk About AIDS, Deborah Ellis.
• Our Whole Lives: Sexual Education, Unitarian Universalist Association – Separate instruction books and workbooks for grades K-1, 4-6, 7-9, 10-12, and adults.
• My Grandma Has AIDS: Annisha’s Story, Valerie Reeder-Bey & Annisha Wilburn.
• Sexualidad y el VIH/SIDA: Modulos innovadores de enseñanza, Ineke Cunningham et al.
• Talk with Young People About HIV: Information and Guidance to Get You Started, The Center for Disease Control and Prevention.
• Teen Life: Frequently Asked Questions About AIDS and HIV, Richard Robinson.
• Teaching Adults to Communicate with Youth from a Christian Perspective, and Teaching Adults to Communicate with Youth from a Muslim Perspective, Family Health International.

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INTRODUCTORY CURRICULA

The New York City Department of Education’s HIV/AIDS Curriculum is available in its entirety.  It’s broken down by grade, from K through 12.  That page also includes brochures and letters for parents (available in 11 different languages) of kids who are being educated.

The Hispanic leadership organization ASPIRA has an extensive HIV Curriculum with facilitator scripts, activities, and other tools.  The entire curriculum is available in Spanish as well.

The British non-profit AVERT has an HIV/AIDS Lessons and Activities webpage, as well as pages for:

• HIV/AIDS quizzes (and quizzes on sex ed, condoms, and pregnancy)
• A dynamic web-based HIV/AIDS game

The United Church of Christ publishes a Curriculum for Multicultural Christian Education, with particular focus on grade school youth.

UNAIDS sponsors a Grassroot Soccer Skillz Curriculum, aimed at teens.  Topics include making healthy decisions, avoiding risks, building support networks, reducing stigma and discrimination, increasing knowledge about testing and treatment, and addressing gender issues.

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MORE SPECIFIC CURRICULA

The Vermont-based Center for Health & Learning has six pages of Curriculum Activities that Support the Use of HIV Positive Speakers.

The Journal of the Association of Nurses in AIDS Care published a Study of a Curriculum Targeted at Older African-American women.

The UCSF Center for AIDS Prevention Studies has a page of Intervention Curricula, including a program for people living with HIV, a harm reduction program aimed at middle schoolers, a prevention program for men who have sex with men, and an adherence program for HIV+ homeless people.

The Northwest Association for Biomedical Research has a multimedia HIV Vaccine Curriculum that explores the life cycle and structure of HIV, different vaccine types, and related ethical issues.

The CDC’s HIV/AIDS Prevention Research Synthesis Project has a page of “Best-Evidence” Interventions. Folks designing programs can read about them there.  Be aware, though, that many of the materials for these interventions are not available for free.­

The CDC publishes guides for educators and administrators developing HIV/AIDS education programs.  These are not curricula, but advice on creating and evaluating curricula.

• Guidelines for Effective School Health Education to Prevent the Spread of AIDS
• Handbook for Evaluating HIV Education

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EDUCATING HEALTH PROVIDERS

AIDS Education is for the pros too!

The AIDS Education & Training Center provides targeted Education Programs for Health Providers treating people living with HIV.  They have slide sets and full curricula on adherence, cultural competence, testing, “prevention with positives,” women, and many more topics.

Baylor College of Medicine International Pediatric AIDS Initiative, in collaboration with the National Institute of Health, UNICEF, and PEPFAR, provides a 376-page HIV Curriculum for the Health Professional.

The American Psychiatric Association has Neuropsychiatry and AIDS curriculum (with class modules and accompanying handouts), designed “to train non-medical providers to understand the spectrum of cognitive and psychiatric disorders often present in HIV disease, make appropriate referral for patient evaluation and psychiatric care, and provide follow-up care.”

Family Health International has a training manual for health professionals on Contraception for Clients with HIV.

The International Training & Education Center on HIV provides materials to support the development of International HIV Health Programs.

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CURRICULUM SUPPLEMENTS

For people who are designing their own program or curriculum, but want supplements, there are materials to draw on all over the web.

For facts about different aspects of HIV/AIDS, we always point to a few different sets of factsheets (short documents that summarize a topic).

• For factsheets on the epidemic in the United States, see the Center for Disease Control and Prevention’s Factsheets page.
• For factsheets on the epidemic around the world, see the UNAIDS Factsheets page.
• For factsheets on the nature of the virus, its transmission, and its treatment, see the University of New Mexico’s AIDS Info Net.
• For factsheets specifically on HIV prevention, sorted by demographics, risk behaviors, and more, see the University of California, San Francisco’s HIV Prevention Factsheets.

The U.S. Department of Health and Human Services has a page of AIDS Info Graphics and an AIDS Awareness Toolkit.

The PBS series Frontline has a documentary called The Age of AIDS that’s available to watch online.  It’s four hours long, but it’s broken up into chapters that could be good for showing to classes or groups.

The TEACH program at FIGHT has a YouTube channel of educational videos on many HIV/AIDS topics.

The United Nations AIDS Multimedia Gallery has a collection of videos (including PSAs), photo slideshows, and audio presentations and interviews, mostly focusing on the epidemic worldwide.  UNAIDS also publishes a current Report on the Global AIDS Epidemic with more charts, slides, graphics, and multimedia materials.

The Kaiser Family Foundation has a Global HIV/AIDS Timeline.

AVERT has a History of AIDS with an extensive list of news and journal articles for each era of the epidemic

For a collection of news articles about HIV/AIDS going back to 1983, see the New York Times AIDS/HIV page.

If any of these sites use terminology that’s unfamiliar, we recommend the National Institute of Health’s searchable HIV/AIDS Glossary. The glossary is also available in Spanish.

Poetry & Creative Writing

Poetry & Creative Writing In the AIDS Library

Here are some of the books of poetry and short-form creative writing available for check-out in the AIDS Library.

• Americano, by Emanuel Xavier – A collection of poems by a gay Latino poet
• Angels In America, Parts One and Two, by Tony Kushner – An epic “gay fantasia on national themes”
• Beyond Definition: New Writing from Gay and Lesbian San Francisco, edited by Marci Blackman and Trebor Healey – A collection of poems, stories, and other literary offerings concerning lesbian and gay experiences
• Blood Whispers: L.A. Writers on AIDS, edited by Terry Wolverton – An anthology of stories and poetry by writers who have been affected by HIV/AIDS
• Brother to Brother, edited by Essex Hemphill and conceived by Joseph Beam – Stories and poetry by Black Gay men
• City Lights Review, edited by Lawrence Ferlinghetti and Nancy J. Peters – A collection of varied literary works with a portion specifically addressing the cultural response to AIDS
• Confronting AIDS through Literature: The Responsibilities of Representation, edited by Judith Laurence Pastore – Part 2 of this book contains literature, including poetry, regarding AIDS
• Does Your House Have Lions?, By Sonia Sanchez – An epic poem on a family affected by the death of a brother from AIDS
• An Immediate Desire to Survive, by Bill Becker – An 18^th-month diary in verse beginning with the author’s first suspicions he has contracted AIDS
• In the Life, edited by Joseph Beam – The groundbreaking collection of fiction, poetry, and theater on being black and gay in America
• Las Marcas/The Markers, by John Michael Irwin – Poems about grief and life in the age of AIDS
• Poets for Life, edited by Michael Klein – A selection of poetry about AIDS, its effects and people’s responses
• Persistent Voices, edited by Philip Clark and David Groff – A collection of poetry from 45 celebrated poets lost to AIDS
• Rent, by Jonathan Larson – The complete book and lyrics of the Broadway musical about bohemians in Lower East Side NYC
• Unending Dialogue: Voices from an AIDS Poetry Workshop, by Rachel Hadas – Essays, prose and poetry in response to AIDS, mostly written during a poetry workshop given at Gay Men’s Health Crisis in New York City

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Poetry & Creative Writing in Philadelphia

There are many places in Philadelphia where poets and writers have get their work read.  These are some organizations that run creative writing events or collect information about such events.  Note that none are HIV/AIDS-specific.  Click on the links for locations, times, and other details.

The William Way Center hosts a free “Queer Writers’ Collective” on the 4th Saturday of every month at 4pm.

The website of the organization First Person Arts has information about

• Adult Education Courses on “memoir art”
• A Community Writing Project
• Monthly Story Slams
• And a Calendar of upcoming events

The Philadelphia Poetry Collective’s News Page has info on open mic events and other readings.

The Philadelphia Youth Poetry Movement’s Events Page has readings, workshops, and poetry slams.

The Free Library of Philadelphia’s Monday Poets Series includes some open mic events along with readings from talented local and regional poets.

PhillyPoetry.com Calendar lists upcoming events in the greater Philadelphia area.

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Poetry & Creative Writing About HIV/AIDS Online

These are websites where you can read poetry and creative writing related to HIV/AIDS, and some where readers can submit writing to be published online.

As with almost any topic, The Body.com has a wealth of resources, including:

• A Collection of HIV/AIDS-Related Poetry from around the web
• HIV/AIDS related poems from Poetry Month 2010
• Archived Work of The AIDS Poetry Project
• Archived work from Body Positive’s Poetry of HIV project

United Methodist Global Ministries publishes a collection of scripture, poems, prayers, reflections, journal excerpts, and other devotional resources that relate to HIV/AIDS ministry.

The Official AIDS Awareness Poets website features poetry about HIV/AIDS, and accepts submissions to be published on the website.

All Poetry is a website that allows users to submit poetry about any topic including HIV/AIDS, and includes an active community of users giving feedback on each other’s poems.  To sign up and submit poetry click here.

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Online Info About Getting Published

The following websites are not HIV/AIDS-specific or Philadelphia-specific.  They are meant to be places to start for anyone interested in getting their writing published.

A general search on the web for tips on getting writing published will result in many commercial sites.  Here are a few publishing advice websites that aren’t trying to make money off users:

• eHow.com’s Get Your Writing Published
• First Writer.com
• Writer Magazine
• Writer’s Digest

To find a writing program or workshop, see the website of The Association of Writers & Writing Programs.

There are many books on creative writing and on getting published.  This is outside the realm of the AIDS Library’s collection, but click here to see Some Highlights of the Free Library of Philadelphia’s Collection.

The PEN American Center has a Prison Writing Program with details on:

• Its Annual Prison Writing Contest
• Words Over Walls: Starting a Writing Workshop in Prison, which can be downloaded free
• The Handbook for Writers in Prison, which can be ordered by or sent to any incarcerated person free

Transgender Resources

Below you’ll find items available in the AIDS Library, resources in Philadelphia, and a wide-range of online information regarding transgender individuals, transgender youth in particular, providers of transgender folks, transgender law and policy, and some more general transgender information.  I want to stress that the distinction between info for transgender people and for their providers is not precise.  If you’re looking for something specific, you might want to check both sections.  Or contact us in the AIDS Library and we can work together to find what you need!

(I’m going to use “transgender” as an umbrella term below, even though it describes a lot of different people who identify themselves differently.  When a different term is being used, it’s because I’m quoting the resource.)

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In the AIDS Library

BOOKS

• True Selves: Understanding Transsexualism – For Families, Friends, Coworkers, and Helping Professionals, by Mildred L. Brown & Chloe Ann Rounsley
• Feminizing Hormonal Therapy for the Transgendered, by Sheila Kirk
• The Handbook of Lesbian, Gay, Bisexual, and Transgender Public Health: A Practitioner’s Guide to Service, edited by Michael D. Shankle
• With a chapter called “The Whole Person: A Paradigm for Integrating the Mental and Physical Health of Trans Clients”
• A Provider’s Introduction to Substance Abuse Treatment for Lesbian, Gay, Bisexual and Transgender Individuals, by the United States Substance Abuse and Mental Health Services Administration
• With a chapter called “Clinical Issues with Transgender Individuals”
• The Complete Lesbian & Gay Parenting Guide, by Arlene Istar Lev
• With several sections on transgender issues
• Always My Child: A Parent’s Guide to Understanding Your Gay, Lesbian, Bisexual, Transgendered or Questioning Son or Daughter, by Kevin Jennings & Pat Shapiro
• With a chapter called “The Transgendered Teen”

DVDS

• Middle Sexes: Redefining He and She – an HBO documentary by Antony Thomas, narrated by Gore Vidal
• Paris is Burning – The classic portrait of the trans-oriented ball scene in 1980s New York City, directed by Jennie Livingston
• How Do I Look: From Fantasy to Reality – The 2006 follow-up to Paris is Burning, directed by Wolfgang Busch

OTHER RESOURCES

• “Philadelphia Transgender Resource Guide, 2010 Edition” – created by the Mazzoni Center (available online here, but we also keep printed copies in the AIDS Library, which clients are free to take)
• “Transgender Considerations: A Clinical Primer for the Generalist Working with Trans and LGB Patients” – compiled by Arthur Robinson Williams
• “Outlines for Multisectorial Work with Transgender Populations, Human Rights, Sex Work and HIV/AIDS” – by Ximena Salazar L. and Jana Villayzan A. (A paper on the authors’ native Peru, but with international implications.)

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Philadelphia Resources

The Trans-Health Information Project does support groups, case management, and resource referral for transgendered clients.  Formerly a program of Prevention Point, they are in the process of becoming an independent organization.  They have drop-in hours, Monday through Friday, 1-5, and other services.  Call them at 215-568-2221 or see their website for the latest details.

Evolutions is a transgender support group that meets Thursdays, 6-7:30pm at the Mazzoni Center, 21 S. 12^th St, 8^th Floor.  Contact Liza Linder, 215-563-0663.

Sister’s United is a MTF group on Tuesdays 5:30-7:30pm at Colours, 112 N. Broad St, 3^rd Floor.  215-496-0330.

TMAN is a support group for FTM of color on Monday from 7:30-9 at Washington West, 1201 Locust St, 2^nd Floor.  215-834-9063.

We Transition Too is a group for partners of folks transitioning and/or who are gender-variant.  It meets the first Saturday of every month, 2-4 at Washington West, 1201 Locust St, 2^nd Floor.  215-732-1207.

WeXist is a support group for FTM on the second Friday of each month from 6-8pm at the at the William Way Community Center, 1315 Spruce St. 215-250-1548

Transway is weekly drop-in social group for MTF on Thursdays from 7-9pm at the William Way Community Center, 1315 Spruce St.

Young, Trans, & Unified is for all trans or gender non-conforming youth, 13-23, meeting Thursday 7-8:30 at the Attic Youth Center, 55 S. 16^th St.  215-545-4331.

There’s a MeetUp.com called Philadelphia TG, TS, Transgender Meetup Group.  This information is not attributed to any formal organization, but the majority of the events listed are at prominent “gayborhood” establishments.

The Renaissance Transgender Association has several nearby chapters – in Wayne, Moutville, and Trexlertown in PA, and Wilmington in DE, though none in Philadelphia.

In addition to hosting some groups listed above, the Mazzoni Center:

• Offers LGBT Legal Services (for information call 1-866-LGBT-LAW or 215-563-0657)
• Coordinates the annual Philadelphia Trans-Health Conference (which will be June 2-4 in 2011)
• And publishes the Philadelphia Transgender Resource Guide, 2010 Edition with lists of trans-friendly doctors, dentists, surgeons, mental health professionals, and more.

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Info Primarily for Transgender Clients

[Though some of this will be useful for providers and other professionals]

The Test Positive Aware Network published a special issue of Positively Aware on Transgender and HIV.  You can read or print the whole thing from that link, or go directly to:

• A transgender therapy primer
• Transgender therapy and HIV
• Safer Sex post-SRS
• Seeking Validation: Transitioning is a Celebration of Who You Are
• Or see the table of contents (at the right of any of those pages) to find an article of interest

The British organization Gender Identity Research and Education Society, in conjunction with the British National Health Service, has a page of Information for Trans People, which includes downloadable brochures about hormones, surgery, and other issues that are universal.  (They also have info on name-changes and other legal issues that would be relevant only to British citizens.)

Trans-Health.com is an online magazine of health and fitness for transsexual and transgendered people with subsections on

• Health and Well-Being
• Hormones
• Mental & Emotional Health
• Surgery
• Transitioning
• And more

The International Foundation for Gender Education has a lot of material at its website, including:

• “Our Stories” – collection of narratives by transgender individuals
• Book/Media reviews of items concerning transgender topics
• Support Groups by State

FTM International serves the Female-to-Male community.  Their website includes:

• FTMI meetings all over the country and the world
• FTM Resources written for populations including parents, partners, and youth

The Canadian group Queer Transman publishes a guide Primed: The Back Pocket Guide for Transmen & the Men Who Dig Them.

The website TransFM has internet radio stories on transgender issues, including a lot of inspiring-looking Personal Stories (exclusively of MTF folks).

The website My Right Self has a series of thoughtful stories on being transgender, with an accompanying photo series for each personal profiled.  Check out the profile of FIGHT’s very own Val Sowell!  They also have some a page of Resources for Transfolks and a White Coat Card for Physicians.

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Info for Transgender Youth and their Parents & Allies

Gender Spectrum provides, education, training and support around working with gender-variant children and teens, and publish info on:

• Raising a Transgender Child
• Resources for Educators
• Transgender Youth and Athletics

TransYouth Family Allies has info for parents, youth, and educators.  They run a hotline : 1-888-462-8932.  They also collect a stories and blogs about having a transgender youth at their TransParent Jouneys page.

TransKids Purple Rainbow Foundation has info on their site including an FAQ for parents, an email helpline (stephanie@transkidspurplerainbow.org), and links to news stories about transgender kids.

The British organization Gender Identity Research and Education Society has a nice collection of “articles for and about gender variant youngsters.”

For inspiring stories, trans or gender non-confirming youth might want to use Live Journal’s TransYouth Community, which collects the online journals of anyone who chooses to be in that online community.

A librarian in Minnesota identifying herself as “the trains-library-geek” has a page of recommended Books for Trans Teens.

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Info Primarily for Medical Providers & Other Professionals

[Though some of this will be useful for transgender clients]

The University of California, San Francisco’s Center of Excellence for Transgender Health publishes online an array of resources for the professional working with transgender clients, including:

• Guidelines, Reports, and Best Practices
• Journal Articles & Research Summaries
• National & International Organizations

The website of the World Professional Association for Transgender Health (formerly the Harry Benjamin International Gender Dysphoria Association) has:

• Standards of Care for Gender Identity Disorders
• Back issues of their International Journal of Transgenderism – all of which can be read for free online

Gay Men’s Health Crisis has a short article aimed at providers on Transgender People, Hormonal Therapy and HIV Treatment Interaction (or download a PDF here of the entire issue of Treatment Issues that has that article).

The website TransGender Care, the website of a doctor who does Sexual Reassignment Surgery in Florida, has pages on:

• Hormones
• Electrolysis
• Gender Expressions
• Your Transgender Journey – An Introduction

The website Transsexual Women’s Resources, written by doctor and academic Anne Lawrence, collects articles written by Dr. Lawrence and by transgender folks edited by her, on:

• Hormone Therapy
• Sex Reassignment Surgery
• Orchiectomy (Castration)
• Breast Augmentation
• Facial Feminization Surgery
• Voice Feminization Surgery
• Autogynephilia & Sexuality
• Standards of Care

The website Medical Advocates has a page collecting Transgendered/Transsexuals peer-reviewed research.

The American Medical Association has an official statement on Removing Financial Barriers to Care for Transgender Patients, which can be read online.  The organization Gay & Lesbian Advocates and Defenders (GLAD) has published a Factsheet on the AMA’s Statement.

The British organization Gender Identity Research and Education Society, in conjunction with the British National Health Service, has a page of downloadable guides for clinicians.

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Transgender Law and Policy

The National Center for Transgender Equality does advocacy work for transgender people.  Their website includes:

• 52 Things You Can Do for Transgender Equality (which can be printed as a poster here)
• Know Your Rights: Information for Transgender Travelers
• A Job Discrimination Survey
• Teaching Transgender – A how-to guide for leading trainings about the lives of transgender people
• And introductions to other transgender legal issues such as employment, documentation, homelessness, immigration, hate crimes, and more.

The National Gay & Lesbian Task Force has a page for its Transgender Civil Rights Project.  They have a hotline (202-639-6308) for “those working to establish or enforce policies and laws to create equality for transgender people,” and publish:

• Opening the Door to the Inclusion of Transgender People: The Nine Keys to Making LGBT Organizations Fully Transgender-Inclusive
• Transgender Equality: A Handbook for Activists and Policymakers
• Transitioning Our Shelters: A Guide to Making Homeless Shelters Safe for Transgender People

And a series of Reports and Factsheets on Transgender Law and Policy

The American Bar Association’s Sexual Orientation and Gender Identity Committee publishes the materials from ABA conference session on Representing Transgendered Clients in Employment Discrimination Cases.

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General Transgender Information

The site Transsexual Road Map has a very good Glossary of Transgender Terms, while The Gay & Lesbian Alliance Against Defamation publishes a Transgender Media Reference Guide.

There are many interesting transgender news stories and profiles – such as the story of The First Transgender Presidential Appointee, or the New York Time’s proposal that “2010 will be remembered as the year of the transsexual”.  A couple good ways to find fresh news stories about transgender issues are:

• TheBody.com’s collection of articles about Transgender People & HIV/AIDS
• A Google News search for “Transgender” (or something more specific)
• The New York Times “Articles About Transsexuals” page

Personal Stories

In the AIDS Library

The AIDS Library has a large collection of personal stories of folks living with HIV – and some not about HIV, but about related issues: coming out, addiction, incarceration, etc.  I’ve listed some highlights below.

After each listing, I made a demographic note about the author or subject, unless it was obvious from the title (and insofar as I could discern it – I’m not going to claim that I’ve read all these books myself).  I did this on the grounds that people are often interested in reading the stories of people with whom they identify personally.  This is of course not intended to pigeonhole any of the books below, or to assume that our clients have self-centered reading interests.  Rather it’s to help people get efficiently to the information they want.

*Indicates the book is new to the AIDS Library collection.

Autobiographies & Memoirs

• Blood Brothers, by Nancy Shaw – a mother and her HIV+ child
• Borrowed Time: An AIDS Memoir, by Paul Monette – a gay male couple
• City Boy: My Life in New York During the 1960’s and ‘70s, by Edmund White – a gay man
• Dancing in  Wheelchair: One Family Faces HIV/AIDS, by Fritz Mutti and Etta Mae Mutti
• *Days of Grace: a Memoir, by Arthur Ashe – an autobiography of the famous tennis player
• Eighty-Sixed, by David B. Feinberg – a gay man
• In the Absence of Angels, by Elizabeth Glaser – a transfusion-infected mother and her perinatally exposed child
• *I Have Something to Tell You: A Memoir, by Regan Hofmann – a straight woman (the editor of POZ magazine)
• *I Was Born This Way: A Gay Preacher’s Journey Through Gospel Music, Disco Stardom, and a Ministry in Christ, by Archbishop Carl Bean
• Living and Dying in 4/4 Time, by Paul Gallotta – a gay man
• My Unicorn Has Gone Away: Life Death, Grief and Living in the Years of AIDS, by Robert J.L. Publicover – a gay man
• One Boy at War: My Life in the AIDS Underground, by Paul A. Sergios – a gay man
• Penitent, with Roses: An HIV+ Mother Reflects, by Paula W. Peterson
• Remember to Breathe, by Dawn Breadon – a straight African-American woman
• Ryan White: My Own Story, by Ryan White – a transfusion-infected boy
• Sing Me to Heaven: The Story of  Marriage, by Margaret Kim Peterson – a serodiscordant straight couple
• To All the Girls I’ve Loved Before: An AIDS Diary, by J. W. Money – a straight man
• Tweeds, by Clayton R. Graham – a gay man
• You Get Past the Tears, by Patrcia and Hydeia Broadbent – an African-American mother and her HIV+ child

Biographies & Profiles

• Chicken Soup for the Prisoner’s Soul: 101 Stories, by Jack Canfield, Mark Victor Hansen, and Tom Lagana
• Common Heroes: Facing a Life Threatening Illness, by Eric Blau – a wide range of people, but each story separate
• *Dangerous Intimacies: Ten African American Men With HIV, by Christopher Lance Coleman and Christopher A. Brooks
• A Dance Against Time: The Brief, Brilliant Life of a Joffrey Dancer, by Diane Solway – a bisexual man
• *Fela: From West Africa to West Broadway, by Trevor Shoonmaker – a biography of the famous musician
• I Will Survive: The Story of 3 HIV-Infected Children, Their Families, and the Stigmatization They Faced, by Apichat Jariyavilas and others
• *Mapplethorpe: A biography, by Patricia Morrisroe – a biography of the famous photographer
• My Own Country: A Doctor’s Story of  Town and Its People in the Age of AIDS, by Abraham Verghese – many PWAs from one Tennessee town
• Our Stories, Our Songs: African Children Talk About AIDS, by Deborah Ellis
• *Pedro & Me: Friendship, Loss, and What I Learned, by Judd Winick – a profile of Pedro Zemora by one of his MTV Real World housemates
• *SistahFaith: Real Stories of Pain, Truth, and Triumph, by Marilyn Griffith
• Surviving AIDS, by Michael Callen – profiles of a range of people living with HIV/AIDS
• They Conquered AIDS: True Life Adventurers, by Scott Gregory and Bianca Leonardo – profiles of many PWAs
• *We Are All the Same: A Story of  a Boy’s Courage and a Mother’s Love, by Jim Wooten

Fiction

• Any Way the Wind Blows, by E. Lynn Harris – a straight African-American couple
• Beyond the Wind, by Rob N. Hood – a gay youth
• Bloodstream, by Joel Redon – a young straight PWA dealing with death
• Blue Pills: a Positive Love Story, by Frederik Peters – a serodiscordant gay couple
• *Christ Like, by Emanuel Xavier – a gay Latino man
• Closing Distance, by Jim Oliver – a gay man
• Facing It: A Novel of AIDS, by Paul Reed – a young gay man at the beginning of the epidemic
• Half-Way Home, by Paul Monette – “two brothers, one gay, one straight, one facing AIDS, the other on the run from his life”
• Love, Debra, by Fritz Hamilton – a child with an HIV+ parent
• *No More Tomorrows: Two Lives, Two Stories, One Love, by Rodney Lofton – a gay couple
• *Push, by Sapphire – an African-American teen girl (the inspiration for the movie Precious)
• *Snow White: A Survival Story, by Anna J. – a straight African-American girl (in Southwest Philly!)
• When Heroes Die, by Penny Raife Durant – a child and his HIV+ uncle

DVDs

Many of our movies have personal stories weaved in to their larger narratives, but these are a few that seem like they might be particularly inspirational.

• Amanda’s Story: What If You’re 15 and HIV-Positive – a short profile of an African-American Philadelphia teen
• The Cure – the friendship between two boys, one perinatally infected with HIV
• An Early Frost – a white gay man and his family
• Homeless to Harvard – based on a true story of a child of HIV+ drug addicts who a scholarship to Harvard
• Life Support – based on a true story of an African-American HIV+ woman
• One + One – “Two couples of mixed HIV status choosing to love in spite of fear”
• *Pedro – a biopic of gay HIV+ MTV Real World star Pedro Zemora
• *Peter Allen: The Boy From Oz – a biopic of gay HIV+ songwriter Peter Allen
• The Smith Family: One Family’s Uncommon Struggle to Keep Faith and Family – a Mormon family dealing with the HIV diagnoses of both father and mother
• Three Needles -  “a portrait of people around the world facing the harsh realities of the AIDS crisis”

The Library also has a binder of Role Model Stories collected by PHMC.  These are 1-2 page personal narratives about topics like HIV/AIDS, addiction, condom negotiation, pregnancy, and more.  They are housed in a binder that sits on the back desk of the library.

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Personal Stories on the Web

The Body.com has a series of webpages collecting Inspiring Stories of People Affected by HIV/AIDS from all over the web.  It’s sorted by population:

• Women
• Men (sorted by sexual preference)
• Transgender People
• Young People
• Older People
• Families & Loved Ones

The Body.com also hosts

• This Positive Life, their own series of longer interviews (20-40 minutes) with people living HIV/AIDS
• From Me to You: Tips on Dealing With an HIV/AIDS Diagnosis, several dozen audio files of folks sharing their experience and offering advice about being diagnosed with HIV

POZ.com has a page of personal stories about being diagnosed with HIV, Think Positive, and a Spanish version, Piensa Positivo.

The website The Positive Project is a great collection of shorter video clips of people infected and  affected by HIV.  It has multiple videos of 85 separate people (and counting).  Users can sort by population, but also by topics such as “finding out,” “medical care,” “disclosure,” and “social life.”  If you wanted, say, videos of HIV+ African-American women talking about parenting issues, you would find 23 clips from 9 separate women!

There are many other websites with personal stories about living with HIV/AIDS.  Here are links directly to stories from:

• AVERT
• Guide4Living
• Revolution Health
• NAM Life
• Ecumenical Advocacy Alliance (personal stories of children living with HIV)
• AIDSvideos.org
• Experience Project
• AOL Health

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Tell Your Story

Over the summer of 2010, the AIDS Library offered a pilot program of a class that we’re planning to offer in 2011: Digital Storytelling.  Five people told a piece of their personal stories using words and pictures.  You can see the results at the AIDS Library YouTube page.  If folks would like to get on a list to be included in these classes, they should can contact the Library (215-985-4851) and fill out a registration form.  They’ll be contacted as soon as the class is available.

The following websites allow people to submit their story for publication.  Each organization has its own requirements, though, so folks should check these links to see what needs to be done to get published.

• AVERT
• NAM Life
• Revolution Health
• Experience Project

The XVIII International AIDS Conference

A few Philadelphia FIGHT staff attended the International AIDS Conference (IAC) in Vienna last July.  They brought back a lot of interesting materials, which will be available in the AIDS Library.

They include all the official IAC materials, as well as position papers and reports by organizations all over the world working on HIV/AIDS.  Some are big books, some are short fact sheets, some are DVDs and other multimedia.

All of the material is available in the AIDS Library starting this week.  Stop by any time we’re open – Monday through Friday, 1pm to 5pm – and catch up on the global response to the epidemic.  Just be aware that the items can be viewed and copied in the Library, but that they can’t be checked out.

Below is a list of the materials, sorted by topic.  Under that are links to videos and other info about the IAC, as well as some news and opinion reports on it.

IAC Materials in the AIDS Library

CONFERENCE MATERIALS

• the conference program book
• two-volume collection of abstracts of all sessions
• booklets of program activities and program supplements
• booklet of “Key Areas of Special Interest to People Living With HIV”
• conference CD-ROM
• UNAIDS Outlook – a big magazine-style collection of articles, interviews and fantastically designed graphs
• UNAIDS Library, a CD-ROM by UNAIDS

TREATMENT

• Antiretroviral Therapy for HIV Infection in Infants and Children: Towards Universal Access, World Health Organization
• Drug Control and Access to Controlled Medicines: A Global View map, by Human Rights Watch
• TAG 2010 Pipeline Report, by Treatment Action Group

PREVENTION

• Do Well and Scale Up Comprehensive HIV Programmes: 2010, a CD-ROM by the International Federation of Red Cross and Red Crescent Societies
• Mandatory Premarital HIV Testing: An Overview by the Open Society Institute
• Woman and HIV Testing: Policies, Practices, and the Impact on Health and Human Rights, by the Open Society Institute
• Standards of Prevention in HIV Prevention Trials: Consultation Report and Recommendations, by the Global Campaign for Microbicides
• All About Condoms, an interactive CD by the UN Populations Fund
• What Works for Women and Girls: Evidence for HIV/AIDS Interventions Executive Summary, by the Open Society Institute
• Cervical Cancer Action Planner, a CD-ROM by the Program for Appropriate Technology in Health
• Avahan-The India AIDS Initiative: The Business of HIV Prevention at Scale, by the India AIDS Initiative
• Global Reach: How Trade Unions are Responding to AIDS, by the International Labour Organization and UNAIDS

MICROBICIDES

• From Promise to Product: Advancing Rectal Microbicide Research and Advocacy, by the International Rectal Microbicide Advocates
• Microbicides: Ways Forward, by the Alliance for Microbicide Development
• Hope Against HIV: Microbicide Trials in Your Community, a video by Population Council and Paw Print Productions

LIVING WITH HIV/AIDS

• More Than Just a Roof Over My Head: Housing for People Living with HIV/AIDS Around the World, by the National AIDS Housing Coalition
• Principles of Physical and Cognitive Rehabilitation in HIV Disease, by Dr. Will Chegwiggen, et al
• Growing Older with the Epidemic: HIV and Aging, by Gay Men’s Health Crisis
• Recommendations Concerning HIV and AIDS and the World of Work, by the International Labour Office
• An ILO Code of Practice on HIV/AIDS and the World of Work, by the International Labour Organization
• Heart of a Hero, a comic set in Trinidad and Tobago about HIV-related stigma
• A Silence is Broken, a book of HIV-themed poems by Gary Gumbs

SUBSTANCE USE [see also under “PRISON,” below]

• Drug Policy Guide, by the International Drug Policy Consortium
• International Harm Reduction Resources CD-ROM, by the International Harm Reduction Development Program
• Illegal Drugs: The Problem is Prohibition, The Solution is Control and Regulation, by the Transform Drug Policy Foundation
• After the War on Drugs: Blueprint for Regulation, by the Transform Drug Policy Foundation
• Syringe Exchange Programs Around the World: The Global Context, by Gay Men’s Health Crisis
• The Adventures of Methadone Man and Buprenophrine Babe – a comic published by the Open Society Institute
• Know Your Drug War, by the Transform Drug Policy Foundation

PRISON

• Sentenced to Stigma: Segregation of HIV-Positive Prisoners in Alabama and South Carolina, by the American Civil Liberties Union
• Advancing the Sexual and Reproductive Health and Human Rights of Prisoners Living With HIV, by the Global Network of People Living With HIV
• China: Where Darkness Knows no Limits – Incarceration, Ill Treatment and Forced Labor as Drug Rehabilitation in China, by Human Rights Watch
• An Unbreakable Cycle – Drug Dependency, Mandatory Confinement and HIV/AIDS in China’s Guangxi Province, by Human Rights Watch
• Skin on the Cable – The Illegal Arrest, Detention and Torture of People Who Use Drugs in Cambodia, by Human Rights Watch
• Barred from Treatment – Punishment of Drug Users in NY State Prisons, by Human Rights Watch

SEX WORK

• Arrest the Violence: Human Rights Abuses Against Sex Workers in Central and Eastern Europe and Central Asia, booklet and CD-ROM by Sex Workers Rights Advocacy Network
• Sex Work, HIV/AIDS and Human Rights in Central and Eastern Europe and Central Asia, by the Central and Eastern European Harm Reduction Network
• Multilanguage Information Materials for Sex Workers CD-ROM, by Tampep International Foundation: European Network for HIV/STI Prevention and Health Promotion among Migrant Sex Workers
• Sex Workers’ Rights – a magazine-style collection by International Committee on the Rights of Sex Workers in Europe
• Outlines for Multisectorial Work with Transgender Populations, Human Rights, Sex Work and HIV/AIDS, by Ximena Salazar L. & Jana Villayzan A.
• Taking Care of Yourself: A Guide for Trans Sex Workers, by the Sex Worker Education and Advocacy Task Force

LAWS & RIGHTS

• HIV/AIDS and the Rule of Law: Rights Here, Right Now, by the American Bar Association
• HIV/AIDS and Human Rights, by Human Rights Watch
• HIV/AIDS & Human Rights: A Resource Guide, by the Open Society Institute
• Toolkit: Scaling Up HIV-Related Legal Services, by UNAIDS, the International Development Law Organization, United Nations Development Programme
• The Impact of HIV-Related Restrictions on Entry, Stay, and Residence: An Annotated Bibliography, by the UNAIDS International Task Team on HIV-Related Travel Restrictions
• Human Rights & HIV/AIDS: Now More Than Ever, by UNAIDS
• “Please, Do Not Make Us Suffer Any More. . .”: Access to Pain Treatment as a Human Right, by Human Rights Watch
• Report of the International Task Team on HIV-Related Travel Restrictions, by UNAIDS

DISABILITY

• Disability and HIV/AIDS: A Short Film About the Situation of Person with Disabilities and Their Struggle Against HIV/AIDS in Uganda, by the Disabled People’s Organisations Denmark
• Disability and HIV/AIDS factsheet, by the Disabled People’s Organisations Denmark
• A Glimpse at Handicap International HIV and AIDS Initiatives, by Hadicap International

LEISURE READING [The most fun items of the whole lot, I thought]

• The ACT UP Paris 20^th Anniversary book – in French, but over half pictures.  A beautifully constructed book, brilliantly titled “We Regret to Announce the 20^th Anniversary of ACT UP Paris.”
• Mosotos News: More Talk from the Vienna AIDS Conference – an Onion-meets-Adbusters satirical critique of the IAC by the group Advocacy to Control TB Internationally

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IAC Info on the Web

The IAC 2010 website has digital copies of conference programs and abstracts, info on presenting organizations, final statistics for the conference, photos, and more.

The Kaiser Family Foundation published Online Coverage of the IAC, including videos and transcripts of presentations, daily reports from Science magazine, podcasts, and more.

The Vienna Declaration on the Global War on Drugs can be read and signed online.

Many organizations and bloggers have published their thoughts on the IAC.  Here are a few:

• The International AIDS Vaccine Initiative
• The National AIDS Treatment Advocacy Project
• Project Inform
• Take a Number (in Vienna) – bloggers organized by Health GAP
• The Guardian’s Katine Chronicles Blog
• LGBT POV
• Intellectual Property Watch

Health GAP also collected Press Coverage of the IAC.

Recovery

IN THE AIDS LIBRARY

We have a lot of good resources on Recovery in the library, including:

BOOKS

*Mindful Recovery: A Spiritual Path to Healing From Addiction, by Thomas Bien and Beverly Bien

*The Life Recovery Workbook: A Biblical Guide through the 12 Steps, by Stephen Arterburn and David Stoop

*Reclaiming Youth Life: The Gay Man’s Guide to Recovery from Abuse, Addictions, and Self-Defeating Behavior, by Rik Isensee

*The Politics of Crystal Meth: Gay Men Share Their Stories of Addiction and Recovery, by Kenneth Cimino

*How It Works: Recovering Citizens in Post-Welfare Philadelphia, by Robert Fairbanks II

DVDs

*Addiction: Why Can’t They Just Stop – a 14-part HBO series (on four discs)

*Living in Recovery: Getting Gut-Level Honest

*Understanding Addiction

*God as We Understand Him: A Film About Faith and the 12-Step Movement

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GETTING IN RECOVERY

[IN PHILADELPHIA]

Individuals with Medicaid coverage can get into recovery treatment through Community Behavioral Health.  Call CBH’s Mental Health and Substance Use Crisis Referral  24/7 hotline (888) 545-2600, or see the CBH website to read more about what they offer.

Individuals with no medical coverage can get into recovery treatment through Behavioral Health Special Initiative.  Call BHSI at 215-546-1200 or 215-546-6435, or see the BHSI website to read more about what they offer.

[NOT IN PHILADELPHIA]

The U.S. Department of Health and Human Services (HHS) Substance Abuse and Mental Health Services Administration’s (SAMHSA) operates a hotline for alcohol and drug treatment referral, available in English and Spanish: 1-800-662-HELP (4357), and a Substance Abuse Facility Locator for finding treatment programs anywhere in the country.

*Click here to see all the sites SAMHSA lists in Philadelphia.

*Click here to read SAMHSA’s pamphlet on how treatment programs can help “With the Criminal Justice System” and “With the Rest of Your Life.”

Other hotlines worth having at the ready:

• Narcotics Anonymous – (818) 773-9999
• Alcoholics Anonymous – (212) 870-3400
• Al-Anon and Alateen Family Groups – (888) 4 AL-ANON
• Double Trouble in Recovery (for dual mental health and drug abuse problems) – (866) 836-7251
• Recovery, Inc. – (312) 337-5661
• NA Philadelphia Area: 215-NA-WORKS
• Hotlines for South Jersey, Reading, Lancaster, and other areas in the greater Philadelphia are available at the website of the Greater Philadelphia Region of Narcotics Anonymous.

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INFORMATION FOR PEOPLE IN RECOVERY AND THEIR SUPPORTERS

The website of Narcotics Anonymous has a lot of information, including

• a tool to Find a Meeting by city, state, or zip code
• an explanation of What Happens at an NA Meeting
• a huge amount of NA Literature, including the full “Basic Text,” many booklets, pamphlets, and group readings.  (That link is to the English texts – see also NA Literature in 38 Different Languages.)

The website of Alcoholics Anonymous has lots of information, including

• A tool to Find a Meeting by zip code
• A Q&A to decide Is AA For You?
• Literature in the form of the full-text of books (including the “Big Book”) and pamphlets.

See also comparable information on the websites of:

• Heroin Anonymous
• Cocaine Anonymous
• Crystal Meth Anonymous (see also Test Positive Aware Network’s Crystal Meth Recovery guide)
• Pills Anonymous
• Marijuana Anonymous
• Benzodiazepine Anonymous
• Dual Recovery Anonymous
• All Addicts Anonymous

Related to the HBO series that we have in the library (mentioned above), the National Institute on Drug Abuse has partnered with HBO to create a website, Addiction, with some very readable resources and some short videos.  This resource might be good for a person new to recovery, or for their friends or family.  Points of interest on this site include:

• Short essays on What is Addiction Treatment?, What is Detox?, and How to Select a Good Treatment Provider.
• An introduction to Brief Intervention and a longer piece on CRAFT: An Alternative to Intervention
• An explanation of Drug Court, including how to access Drug Court.
• A section on Aftercare and Avoiding Relapse.
• Addiction and the Brain’s Pleasure Pathway: Beyond Willpower (an essay that could be used to reply to the question, “Why don’t they just quit!?”)
• A primer on Fighting Discrimination Against People in Recovery from Alcoholism and Drug Addiction (with information on relevant sections of the Americans with Disabilities Act).

The long-time addiction counselor and researcher William White has a website with an extensive Recovery Toolkit, with lots of practical short readings, checklists, reading lists, and the like.

To learn more about the relationship between substance abuse and mental health problems, see

• The National Library of Medicine’s MedlinePlus page on Dual Diagnosis
• The Depression and Bipolar Support Alliance’s page on Dual Diagnosis and Recovery (with a Q&A addressed to the person in recovery)

 

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FOR PROVIDERS

SAMHSA publishes Evidence-Based Practices: Shaping Mental Health Services Toward Recovery

The Addiction Technology Transfer Center Network has a large library of online info about addiction and recovery, written for health professionals.  It includes subsections on Veterans, Women, Prescription Drug Abuse, Co-Occuring Disorder, and more.

The Addiction Treatment Forum reports on substance abuse and addiction therapies, research, and news, with a particular emphasis on opioids/methadone.

The UCSF’s HIVInSite website has a collection of journal articles, best practice guidelines, slide sets, and more on Substance Abuse and HIV/AIDS.

To find out about drug interactions between HIV meds and recreational drugs, see

• AIDS Education and Training Center’s page on Recreational Drugs and ARTs (with a table of drug interactions)
• New York/New Jersey AIDS Education Training Center’s Recreational Drugs and HIV Antiretrovirals: A Guide to Interactions for Clinicians

 

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OTHER

Friendly employers could read the Mid-Atlantic American’s With Disabilities Act office’s guide on Employing and Accommodating Individuals With Histories of Alcohol or Drug Abuse (excerpted at TheBody.com).

As with so many topics, The Body.com does a great job of collecting “News & Views” on Substance Use & HIV/AIDS and of organizations for Getting Help for Substance Use (many of these organizations are mentioned above).

To learn about advocating for recovering people’s rights, see the organization Faces & Voices of Recovery.  Their website includes:

• A Recovery Bill of Rights, and
• Publications, some written by people in recovery