Fall Networking Event
2018-10-10 - 2018-10-30
You are invited to the UNC CFAR’s Social and Behavioral Sciences Core’s 2018 Fall Networking Event. Please RSVP here by Oct. 30.

Strategies for an HIV Cure
2018-10-10 - 2018-10-12
The fourth biennial Strategies for an HIV Cure meeting will take place on the NIH Main Campus between Wednesday, October 10, and Friday, October 12, 2018.
This is a National Institute of Allergy and Infectious Diseases (NIAID) program-driven meeting with the goal of fostering communication and collaboration among researchers funded by NIAID HIV cure-related programs and grants and with the community at large. The meeting also serves as the venue for this year’s annual joint meeting of the Martin Delaney Collaboratories.
Poster abstracts are highly encouraged, oral presentations will be by invitation only. The meeting is open to the public, and registration is free.

For More Information
The website for the 2018 meeting, which will provide further details on the agenda and meeting logistics, is still under development. For more information on the previous meeting in 2016, please see https://respond.niaid.nih.gov/conferences/hivcuremeeting2016.
For questions, please contact NIAIDHIVCureMeeting@niaid.nih.gov.

PrEP Open House
2018-06-29 14:00 - 15:30 (America/New_York)
NCATEC will be hosting “PrEP Open House: What Doctors Need to Know; What Patients Need to Ask” on Friday June 29 from 2pm to 3:30pm in the first floor auditorium of the Bioinformatics Building (130 Mason Farm Road) on the campus of UNC-Chapel Hill. Public parking is available across the street.
This training will address clinical PrEP basics for those interested in prescribing this one-pill-a-day regimen for the prevention of HIV. The presentation will also cover questions that consumers would want to ask themselves about their readiness to take PrEP and whether or not PrEP is right for them. The training center will review its online PrEP resources for providers and consumers and review PrEP materials available in English and Spanish.
Please register early as we expect a strong interest in this training.

Research Assistant Earns Impact Award
2018-04-05
Thibaut Davy-Méndez, photo by Amy Stern
Each department may nominate three current masters or doctoral students or recent graduates per year for the Impact and Horizon Award. Their research should have direct impact on North Carolina.
Impact Award
On Thursday, April 5, Thibaut Davy-Méndez will receive one of the 2018 UNC Graduate Education Advancement Board Impact Award for his work related to antiretroviral therapy resistance. Of particular import was his contributions to a study whose findings were presented at the 2017 Conference Conference on Retroviruses and Opportunistic Infections (CROI): resistance to newer classes of antiretroviral drugs was significantly lower than older classes of drugs. These findings, Davy-Méndez believes, will help UNC HIV care providers inform their clinical practice.
CFAR Connection
A Research Assistant with the UNC CFAR Clinical Core, Davy-Méndez credits the support of his mentors Joe Eron, MD, and Sonia Napravnik, PhD.

SBSRN Networking Event
2017-12-05 08:00 - 17:00
Carol Golin, MD, Core Director, and Breana Castonguay, MPH, Core Manager, address the group on behalf of the SBSRN Core
On December 5, the UNC CFAR Social and Behavioral Sciences Core, in conjunction with the CODE office, hosted their fall networking event, focused specifically on the science of community engagement.
A wide range of CFAR investigators, community stakeholders, and clinicians attended the event, hosted each semester to provide a forum for multidisciplinary researchers to meet and network with each other. Breana Castonguay, Core Manager, organized and planned the event.
Attendees learned key strategies of effective dissemination used in various public health projects via guided table discussions. This was followed by unstructured networking time, during which people were able to discuss topics of interest and connect to new individuals on a personal and professional level.
Danielle Haley, presenter at the event, shared that the event was a “fantastic opportunity to meet and exchange best practices for collaborating with community members to disseminate study findings.” Haley looks forward to “transferring these ideas to my own work and to forging new partnerships initiated by the Event.”
The core launched their first app to provide information about upcoming events and gather helpful data from those interested in the core’s efforts. This marks an exciting new venture into social media outreach for the SBSRN core.
Participants were delighted to have both structured and free time to mingle and share ideas with people working in the field of HIV/AIDS research and community engagement.
Kate Macqueen and Emily Namey from FHI 360 discuss art and theatre with their small group.
Bruce Curran, Adjunct Professor of Journalism at UNC, reflected that the “discussion reinforced my long-held belief that our messages are most effective when we talk not just about the facts of what we do but include the passion of why we do it”.
Topics covered at the event included:
Art and Theater – Kate MacQueen, UNC CFAR & FHI 360, and Emily Namey, FHI 360
Social Media and Journalism – Seth Noar, UNC School of Journalism & Laura Oleniacz, UNC Lineberger Comprehensive Cancer Center
Virtual Dissemination – Kemi Amola and Danielle Haley, HPTN 064 The Women’s HIV Seroincidence Study (ISIS)
Photovoice Forum and Fashion Show – Alex Lightfoot, UNC School of Public Health & the Center for Health Promotion and Diseases Prevention (CDC), and Allison Matthews, UNC Institute for Global Health and Infectious Diseases and UNC Department of Social Medicine
Global Dissemination – Wendee Wechsberg, RTI International

Register for World AIDS Day Symposium
2017-10-27
Register now for our World AIDS Day Symposium! And check out the agenda!

Video: CFAR Cores Present at Friday Conference
2017-09-22
The directors of the UNC CFAR’s Biostatistics, Developmental, and Social and Behavioral Science Research Cores presented during Friday Morning Conference on Sept. 22. Watch their presentations here.

FHI 360 / CFAR Brown Bag Event
2016-10-14
CFAR Director Dr. Ronald Swanstrom welcomes everyone to the event!
On October 14th, senior researchers from FHI 360 and the UNC CFAR gathered for a brown bag lunch event to explore ways that the two organizations can expand their collaborations and offer support to each other in their HIV research and clinical efforts.
Katie Mollan explains the services offered by the CFAR Biostatistics Core.
Kate MacQueen, Senior Scientist at FHI 360 and Core Director of the CFAR Developmental Core, shared that the idea for the event grew out of conversations with Ron Swanstrom on how “we could foster more engagement between FHI 360 scientists and UNC CFAR leadership”. MacQueen commented, “At FHI 360 we have a long-standing tradition of brown bag lunches to communicate with each other about our work as well as to introduce established and potential partners to our in-house colleagues. This seemed a perfect mechanism to showcase what the UNC CFAR has to offer FHI 360 researchers engaged in HIV work or interested in pursuing such work.”
Ron Swanstrom, CFAR Director, welcomed the group to start the meeting. Kate MacQueen discussed the funding opportunities and support for researchers offered by the Developmental Core. Marcia Hobbs (pictured below), VIM Core Co-Director, discussed STI testing capacity. Jeff Stringer, CFAR International Core Director, shared about the CFAR’s commitment to women’s reproductive health locally and globally. Carol Golin, Social and Behavioral Sciences Research Core Director, discussed the social and behavioral instrument database, a valuable tool produced by the core. Katie Mollan (pictured above), Biostatistics Core Manager and Cam Bay, Statistician, offered information about the statistical consulting services the core provides.
Marcia Hobbs addresses the group about the VIM core and STI testing capacity at the UNC CFAR.
MacQueen noted that they had a “great turnout for lunch” and “the people who attended were very engaged, asking a lot of questions”. The feedback she received from her FHI 360 colleagues is that “they discovered a lot about the UNC CFAR resources and gained a much better appreciation for how the CFAR can support their work”.
Plans are in the works to invite FHI 360 HIV researchers and program managers to UNC to describe their work and brainstorm about opportunities for scientific collaboration between the two organizations. Stay tuned!
