Testing / Prevention on Wheels

Overview of LIAAC’s mobile outreach, HIV testing, and Hep C-screening facilitation program

The hallmark of LIAAC’s integrated mobile service program is: using traveling service centers proactive wheeled approach (vans/r.v.’s and trained mobile staff) to overcome barriers and literally bring an array of core services to disadvantaged clients "on their own turf," in culturally and linguistically sensitive ways. The program builds and earns trust among distressed community members by helping them first receive services that are most needed and most important to them. LIAAC’s "no wrong door" policy means that every individual encountered through our program receives access to an extremely wide net of highly needed services: medical care, food & shelter assistance, mental health treatment, and social service advocacy, as well as help obtaining benefits.

LIAAC’s direct mobile services include HIV and hepatitis prevention education and these core services:

• Counseling before HIV testing (to assure client readiness)

• Counseling after HIV test results, whether results are positive or negative

• Confirmatory HIV testing in cases of preliminary HIV+ results

• Instant intake into HIV+ case management when indicated and when desired by our clients

• Instant intake into HIV prevention case management for very high-risk clients

• Establishing long-term personal care plans, intensively monitored and supported by LIAAC

LIAAC achieves measurable, meaningful outcomes by combining several evidence-based models including: (1) the Health Belief Model, (2) the United States National Institute on Drug Abuse (NIDA) Community-Based Outreach Model, (3) the Harm Reduction Model; and (4) the Transtheoretical Model of Behavior Change.

LIAAC has received funding from a wide variety of government sources, enabling special areas of focus and attention during service delivery including HIV rapid testing (supported especially by the multiple agencies, including Centers for Disease Control and Prevention—[CDC], the Substance Abuse and Mental Health Services Administration [SAMHSA], the Office of Minority Health, and the New York State Department of Health [NYSDOH] ); linkage to substance abuse treatment facilities (supported by the Substance Abuse and Mental Health Services Administration—SAMHSA); specialized attention to Hepatitis C prevention and assistance to people recently released from jail (supported by SAMHSA); specialized attention to Black and Latino individuals at-risk (supported by all, including the Office of Minority Health); and specialized attention to issues of nutrition (supported by New York State Department of Health). Each of these government agencies helps support not just these narrow focus areas but also many closely related aspects of the mobile service delivery and the integrated nature of LIAAC’s service delivery.