Description
Course Summary:
This course consists of a manual developed by the National Institute on Drug Abuse (NIDA) that has been scientifically tested for community-based outreach to reduce the risk of HIV and other blood-borne infections in drug users.
The model described in this manual is based on many years of research. The model has been implemented and tested in many communities with thousands of injection drug users and many of their sex partners. The model has also been adapted and tested with nearly 14,000 crack users and tailored to the needs of specific at-risk subgroups, including women who inject drugs, men who use drugs and have sex with men, and drug and sexual risk networks.
Overall, the model has been found to be effective with multiracial, multiethnic, male and female, HIV seropositive and seronegative, infected and non-infected drug-using populations residing in areas with low, medium, and high HIV prevalence.
Course Goals/objectives
The goals and objectives for this course are for the student to understand:
• Research-based principles of HIV prevention for drug-using populations;
• The research support for the model;
• The community-based outreach model;
• The logistics of the model;
• How to access and engage those at risk;
• Personal risk assessment;
• Strategies for risk reduction;
• Reinforcement and support of risk-reduction efforts;
• Logistical concerns in implementing the model;
• How to establish a field station;
• How to provide training to staff
• How to provide supervision to staff
Your Course Instructor:
Robert Shearer, PhD
Dr. Robert A. Shearer is a retired professor of criminal justice in the College of Criminal Justice, Sam Houston State University. He has been teaching, training, consulting, and conducting research in the fields of criminal justice, human behavior, and addictions for over thirty-six years. He is the author of over sixty professional and refereed articles in criminal justice and behavior. He is also the author of Interviewing: Theories, Techniques, and Practices, 5th edition published by Prentice Hall. Dr. Shearer has also created over a dozen measurement, research, and assessment instruments in criminal justice and addictions including Law Enforcement Strategies Scale (LSS), Correctional Strategies Scale (CSS), Probation Strategies Scale (PSS), Correctional Treatment Resistance Scale (CTRS), the Comprehensive Substance Abuse Counseling Orientation Inventory (CSACOI), and the Substance Abuse Consequences Scale (SACS).
He has been a psychotherapist in private practice and served as a consultant to dozens of local, state, and national agencies. He has taught courses in interviewing, human behavior, substance abuse counseling, drugs and crime, and correctional counseling. He is currently developing an Interrogation Tactics Scale that measures levels of approval of coercion in interrogations with suspected offenders.
He has been the president of the International Association of Addictions and Offender Counseling and editor of the Journal of Addictions and Offender Counseling. Recently, Dr. Shearer completed a survey of the beliefs of over 300 substance abuse counselors in a large correctional system in the southwestern U.S. He is a member of the Citizen Potawatomi Nation of Oklahoma.