Objective: To understand clinicians' current teclistamab step-up dosing (SUD) model and how they envision future administration models, as well as perceived barriers and facilitators to these models in day-to-day clinical practice.
Methods: Interviews of clinicians with RW experience administering teclistamab, with a subsequent roundtable discussion to discuss interview findings. Topics of interest included managing adverse events (AE), and handling logistics of SUD and transition of care (ToC).
Intimate partner violence is a preventable public health problem affecting more than 12 million people in the United States annually. The immense burden of victimization is most often borne by women. Nearly one in two female homicide victims are killed by current or former partners (more than 50% of which involve firearms).
View Article and Find Full Text PDFNew HIV infections associated with injection drug use are of major concern in rural US communities. This study explores acceptability of, consent for, and uptake of free at-home HIV testing among people who use drugs (PWUD) in one of the nation's epicenters for drug-related harms and HIV vulnerability: Rural Central Appalachia. Eligible participants were 18-35 years old, lived in Appalachian Kentucky, and reported using opioids to get high in the previous 30 days.
View Article and Find Full Text PDFObjective: Law is an important factor in the diffusion of syringe services programs (SSPs). This study measures the current status of, and 5-year change in, state laws governing SSP operations and possession of syringes by participants.
Methods: Legal researchers developed a cross-sectional data set measuring key features of state laws and regulations governing the possession and distribution of syringes across the 50 US states and the District of Columbia in effect on August 1, 2019.
Background: Though overdose rates have been increasing in US rural areas for two decades, little is known about the rural risk environment for overdoses. This qualitative study explored the risk environment for overdoses among young adults in Eastern Kentucky, a rural epicenter of the US opioid epidemic.
Methods: Participants were recruited via community-based outreach.
Background: Epicenters of harmful drug use are expanding to US rural areas, with rural young adults bearing a disproportionate burden. A large body of work suggests that place characteristics (eg, spatial access to health services) shape vulnerability to drug-related harms among urban residents. Research on the role of place characteristics in shaping these harms among rural residents is nascent, as are methods of gathering place-based data.
View Article and Find Full Text PDFBackground: Rural Kentucky is an epicenter of hepatitis C(HCV), especially among young adults who inject drugs. While the Risk Environment Framework (REF) has been used widely to study and address socio-ecological determinants of infectious disease among people who inject drugs (PWID), it has been almost exclusively applied to urban environments. Applying REF to rural environments can enhance our understanding of the drivers of HCV epidemics in these hard-hit areas, and inform the creation and implementation of harm reduction interventions in this local context.
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