Strategies to maintain wellness among HIV positive former heroin users: Uncovering resilience

Abstract

This qualitative study focuses on strategies that HIV+ former opioid users employ to maintain wellness. HIV+ former opioid users who are addressing medication management, depression and other emotional issues, amid the already difficult process of opioid recovery, face multiple challenges not only as individuals but as members of families and social networks. The abuse of opioids, including a number of pharmaceutical pills such as Oxycontin, Hydrocodone, etc., is associated with high relapse rates, infectious disease susceptibility, and criminal justice involvement. Qualitative researchers have developed technologies for recruiting and investigating the drug-using careers of active users, (Galea et al., 2003; Davis et al., 2003) but have not often documented patterns of non-use. We anticipated recruitment to be difficult given the focused methodology. Tiburcio’s coordination work on prior studies developed sufficient network contacts to facilitate these endeavors (Brook et al., 2008). Professional contacts within Designated AIDS Centers (DACs) broadened these comprehensive efforts.

About the Presenter

Nelson J. Tiburcio, PhD
Institute for Special Populations Research
National Development and Research Institutes (NDRI)
nelson.tiburcio@gmail.com

Nelson J. Tiburcio, PhD has been involved in drug treatment program planning, research, evaluation and outcome studies since the late 1980s. His professional expertise includes locating and interviewing hard to reach populations for clinical and research purposes; interviewer training; and coordinating longitudinal follow-up studies with diverse groups. His award-winning doctoral dissertation in Criminal Justice from the Graduate Center of New York (Reisenbach Foundation Award) investigated the long-term recovery process from heroin use and focused on ex-offenders who maintained abstinence for a period of five or more years. He served as an evaluator of several prison-based therapeutic communities for the Office of National Drug Control Policy, and consults to various research organizations on Research Interview Design and Fidelity, Quality Control, and Interviewer Training and Administration. He is a Research Scientist member of the National Hispanic Science Network on Drug Abuse (NHSN) and is one of the founders and former Editor of the National Institutes on Drug Abuse (NIDA) Newsletter El Faro: La Voz de la Red. He was elected Founding Chair of the NHSN Early Career Leadership Committee (ECLC) and is as Chair emeritus serves as an active member of the ECLC.

Dr. Tiburcio served as Project Director of two federally funded and one privately funded studies in the Institute for Treatment Services Research at National Development and Research Institutes in New York City. The NIDA-funded STOP HEP C Project examined the nationwide drug treatment response to the hepatitis C virus. The second study, Project STAR, an acronym for “Staff Training on Alcohol Reduction,” was devoted to the development of a state-of-the-art HIV care provider training to encourage the implementation of NIAAA’s screening and brief intervention (NIAAA’s BI) in Designated AIDS Centers (DACs) throughout New York. Presently in the Institute for Special Populations Research at NDRI, Dr. Tiburcio served as Co- Investigator of a NIDA grant designed to systematically study changes in illicit drug markets (including use and distribution) resulting from Hurricane Katrina in August 2005. The study also examines the reformulation of displaced illegal drug markets and distribution networks throughout New Orleans, and the development of similar networks in Houston, Baton Rouge and other host cities of New Orleans Evacuees (NOE’s). Presently he is Principal Investigator of an R03 NIDA study examining networking and service acquisition, and how these and other services assist HIV+ former opioid users to sustain their efforts.
 
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