2026 USCHA Pathways (Preliminary)

This Institute features the latest chapter of the National AIDS Memorial’s Surviving Voices AIDS oral history and documentary series.  ‘Surviving Voices: AIDS Caregivers’ features firsthand accounts from frontline individuals whose extraordinary acts of care during the devastating early years of the epidemic transformed lives and helped shape the HIV movement.  Conference attendees will view the full short-documentary, along with two of the 14 short interviews conducted this year.  The video presentation will be followed by a panelist conversation moderated by Sister Roma from the San Francisco Sisters of Perpetual Indulgence, featuring interviewees, and John Cunningham, CEO of the National AIDS Memorial.

Son, Rise, Son, Shine: Faith, Stigma, and Self-Worth: Reimagining HIV Conversations in Black Communities explores how personal storytelling, faith, and self-reflection can serve as powerful tools for healing, empowerment, and stigma reduction among Black people living with and impacted by HIV. Drawing from lived experience, leadership in HIV advocacy, and themes from Son, Rise, Son, Shine, this workshop invites participants to examine the intersections of faith, identity, self-worth, and resilience. The session aims to equip attendees with practical approaches for fostering more affirming, culturally responsive, and healing-centered conversations that strengthen engagement, belonging, and well-being in Black communities.

As the HIV/AIDS demographic landscape shifts dramatically, urgent collaboration between HIV service providers and aging services staff of all ages is critical. Currently, around 50% of people living with HIV in the U.S. are over 50. Projections show this increases to 70% by 2030 (CDC). Alarmingly, in San Francisco, 75% of those living with HIV are aged 50 or older. This stark reality underscores the pressing need for integrated services that address the unique challenges faced by the population. This workshop aims to empower participants to act swiftly, foster collaboration and advocacy to enhance the lives of this vulnerable population.

Latino men who have sex with men (LMSM) continue to experience high rates of HIV infection, and PrEP remains central to prevention. Medical mistrust may shape how people interpret healthcare advice, prevention services, and medication options. Prior research has not fully explained how mistrust factors into PrEP decisions among LMSM. This qualitative study examined how LMSM in Chicago/Cook County described healthcare experiences, trust and mistrust, health information, and decisions about PrEP use.

For over four decades, the HIV movement has been shaped by stories of survival, resistance, loss, and resilience. Yet, the voices of Lifetime Survivors, individuals born with or diagnosed with HIV in early childhood, remain underrepresented in mainstream narratives, research, and policy spaces. This interactive institute session introduces Voices of a Lifetime: The Power of ART & Resilience, a community-led storytelling and documentary project created by The Lifetime Survivors Network (LSN). Designed as both a healing space and a catalyst for advocacy, this session will serve as a preview of the upcoming Lifetime Survivors documentary sponsored by Gilead Sciences.

Learning Objectives:
– Describe the unique experiences and needs of Lifetime Survivors and Long-Term Survivors of the HIV movement.

– Gain insight into the ethical, emotional, and practical considerations of collecting and sharing stories within marginalized communities, including consent, safety, and trauma-informed practices.

– Explain how storytelling and digital media can be used for healing, advocacy, and visibility

– Identify best practices for trauma-informed and ethical story collection, including video storytelling

– Explore ways to integrate storytelling into HIV programming, media, and policy efforts

This institute centers Black women’s leadership, storytelling, art, and future-building in response to 45 years of HIV in the United States. Designed as a village gathering and national summit, the session will create space for Black women to remember the annual impact of HIV, name what must change by 2030, and imagine models that protect future generations. Through testimony, creative expression, and visionary planning, participants will explore how Black women can shape an exit strategy for ending new HIV diagnoses in our lifetime.

The session begins with a “walk in her shoes” choose-your-own-adventure activity. Participants guide a pregnant nineteen-year-old newly diagnosed with HIV through real-life decisions, shaping varied outcomes. Each choice reflects challenges, resilience, and opportunity. Facilitators will allow reflection on emotions and encourage understanding from a person-centered perspective. The exercise integrates a trauma-informed approach, helping participants recognize how life experiences influence decision-making. It also highlights the role of implicit bias in shaping perceptions and responses. Overall, the activity builds empathy, strengthens critical thinking, and deepens awareness of the complex factors affecting client experiences and support needs.

This institute will provide training and an opportunity to engage directly with HIV care providers to better understand how domestic violence, including intimate partner sexual violence, impacts engagement in care and experiences of women living with HIV. We will discuss healthcare access, prevention, stigma, safety, and language to better address the concerns of IPV survivors living with HIV and those who would benefit from HIV preventative care. Facilitators will lead structured conversations with small groups to identify gaps in care and program practices that can compromise survivor safety and well-being.

Women living with or vulnerable to HIV often navigate multiple, interconnected health and social challenges that cannot be addressed through HIV care alone. Substance use, recovery, mental health conditions, violence, reproductive health needs, chronic disease, and stigma interact with other domains to shape women’s experiences with HIV prevention, treatment, and long-term wellness. These intersecting factors are especially important for women who use drugs and women in addiction treatment or recovery, yet services remain largely siloed.

This interactive workshop will use a syndemic lens to examine how these overlapping realities influence women’s engagement in care across the life course. Panelists representing lived experience, clinical practice, community organizations, and research will share examples of integrated, trauma-informed, community-designed approaches that are improving outcomes across HIV, substance use, mental health, and reproductive health services—and discuss where critical gaps remain.

Participants will then engage in facilitated World Café discussions to identify persistent implementation barriers, share promising practices from their own communities, and develop practical recommendations for advancing more integrated, person-centered systems of care that better reflect women’s lived experiences.

The following workshop presents insights and implementation strategies from two projects across the HIV prevention and care continuum.; ; The first project presented in the workshop, titled Sailing PrEP, draws on interviews with key informants and men who have sex with men (MSM). This project identifies implementation strategies to expand PrEP access and use in San Juan, Puerto Rico, where MSM bear the highest HIV burden. Our preliminary findings support a culturally responsive, community-driven PrEP navigation program that leverages peer navigators’ shared lived experience and trust. Sustainable implementation will require diversified funding, clinic-community partnerships, workforce training, and coordinated efforts among government, health departments, providers, and MSM communities. During the workshop, we will provide insights into key strategies used by our community-academic working group during the intervention adaptation stage, including rapid qualitative analysis and intervention/implementation mapping.; ; The second initiative explores health behavior and digital health approaches to evaluate and optimize infrastructure in resource-limited and geographically remote communities. We examine the U.S. Virgin Island’s deployment of Beacon, a public health operating system, designed to guide clinical and social services across siloed centers of care. We review impacts of how Beacon’s lightweight EHR and AI infrastructure supports patients, community providers, and facilitates advisory across clinical and social care systems. Audience members can participate in a human-centered design session to explore best practices of technology implementation to serve culturally and linguistically diverse communities.

State policy decisions increasingly shape access to HIV prevention, treatment, and care. This interactive workshop will explore emerging HIV policy trends, including Medicaid and ADAP changes, PrEP access, pharmacy-based prevention, and funding challenges. Drawing on advocacy efforts in Florida, North Carolina, Colorado, Connecticut, Puerto Rico, and South Carolina, participants will learn practical strategies for engaging policymakers, mobilizing communities, and responding to policy threats. Attendees will also hear directly from Florida advocate Michael Rajner about his experience navigating the ADAP crisis. Through real-world scenarios and group discussion, participants will build skills to become effective state-level advocates.

It’s no secret that people living with HIV (PLWH) continue to have much to contribute to the field of biomedical HIV prevention, as HIV treatment and prevention are interconnected! This Institute will reframe the way you think about treatment, cure and prevention. Analytical Treatment Interruption (ATI) studies among PLWH can give researchers unique insight into the development of immune responses that can inform the development of vaccines and broadly neutralizing antibodies (bnAbs) for HIV prevention. We will review the cutting-edge science of ATI studies, advocacy efforts by PLWH, and opportunities for collaboration on future biomedical HIV prevention tools.

Learning Objectives:
By the end of the session, attendees will:

· Understand the scientific advancements around ATIs in HIV Cure

· Understand the science of using ATI studies for preventive HIV vaccine research and potential relevance of this work to HIV cure efforts

· Learn about the role of community in advancing equitable and meaningful HIV research

· Explore opportunities for translating advocacy successes in ATI research into the future of biomedical HIV prevention vaccine efforts

Since ChatGPT’s release in 2022, artificial intelligence (AI) tools have rapidly entered healthcare, public health, and everyday workflows. For the workforce, the challenge is no longer whether AI will influence practice, but how to engage with these tools critically, ethically, and effectively. This workshop explores opportunities and risks of AI in HIV prevention through interactive discussion, guided reflection, hands-on exploration of generative AI use cases, and real-world scenarios. Participants will develop foundational AI literacy skills and leave with a practical framework for assessing readiness, responsible use, and appropriate application in HIV prevention practice.

Ask Me About U=U is a 3-hour workforce development institute designed to help healthcare workers, navigators, peer educators, community health workers, and frontline staff communicate U=U clearly, confidently, consistently, and compassionately across routine HIV prevention, testing, treatment, and care interactions. The institute will introduce participants to practical tools for integrating U=U into status-neutral services, including the 3 Moments of U=U flipbook job aid. Through brief teaching, facilitated discussion, role play, and action planning, participants will leave with concrete strategies to normalize U=U conversations, reduce HIV stigma, and strengthen person-centered care.

Learning Objectives:
By the end of this institute, participants will be able to: Identify at least three routine opportunities to integrate U=U into status-neutral HIV prevention, testing, treatment, and care services. Communicate U=U clearly, confidently, consistently, and compassionately using accurate, person-centered, and stigma-reducing language. Apply the “3 Moments of U=U” framework and flipbook job aid in realistic conversations with clients and community members. Develop a practical action plan for incorporating U=U messaging, tools, and workflows into their organization or service setting.

Despite clear evidence that open, affirming communication about sex and sexual health between patients and providers improves prevention, screening, and treatment of HIV and other STIs, many clinicians, case managers, peer navigators, and health educators report discomfort, lack of training, and uncertainty in discussing it. This interactive workshop, aligned with “United and Unbreakable,” aims to strengthen participants’ confidence and skills in navigating conversations about sex with patients and clients, including the importance of screening and treatment of HIV and STIs to overall health and wellness, and to prepare clients for sometimes challenging conversations about sex, HIV, STIs and overall wellness.

For many years, we have received anecdotal evidence of the poor care women living with HIV receive during the postpartum period of their birthing experience. To address this issue, The Well Project surveyed community members to identify gaps in support and educational needs. Findings revealed gaps in healthcare continuity, peer support, culturally sensitive education, and more. Many respondents reported minimal assistance in maintaining their healthcare during the postpartum period as clinicians focused primarily on pediatric care. This workshop will discuss survey insights, available resources, and strategies to enhance the care for postpartum individuals living with HIV.

Traditional Emergency Department (ED) HIV screening heavily relies on clinician-driven testing. This approach is inherently vulnerable to clinical inertia, time constraints, and implicit bias, where providers frequently rely on outdated risk-profiling. Consequently, critical opportunities for early diagnosis are missed-particularly among women, older adults, and minoritized racial groups who may not fit traditional, subjective risk stereotypes.

Positive Peers is a freely available (positivepeers.org; @positivepeers4U), multifunctional app for young people with HIV (YPWH), utilizing a mind-body-spirit approach, and is currently being evaluated against usual HIV care in a randomized controlled trial. App functions include health information articles (mind), a U=U tracker and medication reminders (body), and a community forum and private chat connecting YPWH to one another (spirit). A preliminary phenomenologically oriented analysis of ongoing qualitative interviews conducted as part of the study identifies barriers and facilitators to app use by YPWH.

This workshop lifts up the leadership and lived experience of people living with HIV (PLHIV) within the HIV BASIC coalition and our data privacy and anti criminalization work. Grounded in Meaningful Involvement of People Living with HIV (MIPA), we explore how medical paternalism, data surveillance, emerging technologies shape access to care, bodily autonomy, and informed consent. This session is grounded in our Consensus Statement which outlines shared principles for resisting the criminalization and misuse of health data. Attendees will use storytelling community led analysis to connect lived experience to systems of power and build strategies for a just HIV response.

The HIV/AIDS epidemic is shaped and sustained by systems of exclusion, inequity, and oppression. As communities face renewed attacks on equity, inclusion, and belonging, a new era of leadership is necessary. This workshop explores trauma-informed and anti-oppressive leadership styles and practices that boldly challenge harmful systems that ultimately cultivate collective liberation. Designed for current and emerging leaders, participants will examine the lessons of the past 45 years and develop skills needed to build justice-centered organizations, systems, and processes to get us closer to ending the HIV epidemic before the next 45 years arrive.

This workshop will explore the impact of the meaningful involvement of people living with HIV (MIPA) in task force initiatives and community driven decision making, particularly within maternal and child health settings. Through real world examples and personal stories from women living with HIV, including long term and lifetime survivors who serve as task force members and leaders, participants will examine how meaningful engagement moves beyond participation to shared leadership. Attendees will gain practical strategies for fostering allyship, building trust, and ensuring community voices are not only heard, but prioritized in shaping programs, policies, and systems that affect their lives.

Black gay men and Black transgender communities continue to experience a disproportionate burden of HIV yet often face the greatest barriers to accessing new prevention technologies. Drawing on lessons from the PrEP Power Initiative, this interactive workshop will explore what it takes to move from innovation to equitable access. Participants will examine community readiness, demand creation, implementation challenges, provider engagement, and accountability strategies related to long-acting HIV prevention. Through case studies, discussion, and practical tools, the session will equip participants with approaches to ensure Black gay and trans communities are prioritized in the rollout, uptake, and scale-up of next-generation HIV

Learning Objectives:
Lessons from the PrEP Power Initiative, combined with emerging U.S. implementation experience, highlight significant risks that long-acting HIV prevention technologies may not reach Black gay men and Black transgender communities equitably without intentional planning and investment. Community consultations and implementation discussions identified recurring challenges related to awareness, trust, provider readiness, stigma, financing, and community-led demand creation. Findings also underscored the importance of engaging Black gay and transgender communities early in product introduction efforts rather than after rollout decisions have already been made. These lessons provide practical insights for U.S. stakeholders seeking to avoid repeating disparities observed during the introduction of oral PrEP and other HIV prevention innovations.

This workshop will examine how immigration policies and enforcement practices affect healthcare access, public health outcomes, and community well-being. Participants will explore the intersection of immigration policy, health equity, and healthcare systems, with particular attention to immigrant communities and populations disproportionately impacted by barriers to care, including people vulnerable to or living with HIV. The session will connect policy decisions to real-world health outcomes and identify opportunities for advocacy, education, and systems-level change.

This institute explores how women living with HIV and our allies are building political power beyond election cycles through voter engagement, political education, leadership development, and grassroots organizing. Grounded in the principles of Meaningful Involvement of People with HIV/AIDS (MIPA), racial and gender justice, and collective liberation, this session centers the leadership and lived experiences of transgender and cisgender women, gender diverse people, and transgender people living with HIV (WGDTLHIV). Participants will explore how the voices, expertise, and leadership of communities most impacted by HIV are essential to shaping policies that impact healthcare access, HIV justice, reproductive justice, bodily autonomy, and economic security. Through the PWN Votes model, participants will learn how year-round organizing creates pathways for people living with HIV to move from being represented in political spaces to leading and shaping the decisions that affect their lives. We will explore strategies for transforming lived experience into collective action, strengthening community accountability, and building sustainable political power that extends beyond the ballot box. Participants will leave with practical approaches for integrating civic engagement, leadership development, and community organizing into their work while uplifting the leadership of women and gender diverse people living with HIV.; ; Learning Objectives:; By the end of this session, participants will be able to: Examine the PWN Votes year-round power-building model and understand how voter engagement, political education, leadership development, and grassroots organizing strengthen HIV justice movements. Identify strategies for transforming lived experience into collective action that advances policy change, community accountability, and leadership by people living with HIV. Explore ways to integrate civic engagement beyond election season by creating sustainable pathways for community members to participate in advocacy, organizing, and decision-making spaces. Recognize the importance of centering the leadership of WGDTLHIV in building movements rooted in racial justice, gender justice, and liberation.

HIV care has always required going where people are. Yet too many organizations remain stuck behind structural, financial, and technological barriers that keep innovative care delivery out of reach. This institute uses CAN Community Health’s real-world experience as a launching pad for field-wide innovation. Participants explore how VR education, online PrEP, home testing, Mobile Medical Units, and home-based injectables are expanding access today, with technology woven throughout as an enabler. Then, through structured design thinking exercises, they generate bold, practical ideas for their own communities and leave with strategies and funding pathways to make them real.

Learning Objectives:
By the end of this institute, participants will be able to: identify care delivery innovations that expand HIV prevention and care access beyond traditional clinic settings; explain how technology functions as an enabler of community-centered care rather than a standalone solution; apply premortem thinking and How Might We design methods to generate barrier-resistant ideas for their own communities; identify at least two strategies for working through common implementation barriers; and describe funding pathways available to support innovation in HIV care organizations of varying sizes and resources.

Adolescents and young adults, (AYA), represent a growing population of new HIV diagnoses in the United States, particularly among individuals aged 13-26 years. In Arizona, young people account for a substantial proportion of new HIV cases, with transmission driven by structural inequities, stigma, limited access to youth-friendly services, and gaps in prevention education. Youth experiencing housing instability and substance use compound HIV vulnerability and are often missed by traditional clinic-based testing models. Expanding accessible, community-based HIV testing, harm reduction, and behavioral health services may better engage high-risk AYA and improve early diagnosis and prevention among young adult populations.

Many organizations rely heavily on grant funding to sustain HIV prevention, care, and support services, yet long-term success requires a broader strategy. This workshop will introduce participants to the 340B Drug Pricing Program, including program eligibility, core requirements, and key compliance considerations for operating a successful and compliant 340B program. Participants will learn how organizations can strategically leverage 340B savings to strengthen organizational capacity, expand patient services, invest in workforce development and infrastructure, and improve financial sustainability. Through real-world examples and practical lessons learned, attendees will gain actionable strategies to maximize resources, maintain compliance, and build stronger, more resilient organizations.

The HIV response depends on organizations that are responsive, accountable, and grounded in the Meaningful Involvement of People Living with HIV/AIDS (MIPA). Yet many organizations continue to struggle with integrating meaningful community leadership into operational and strategic decision-making. Through the Gilead COMPASS Initiative®, people living with and impacted by HIV play a critical leadership role in shaping capacity-building efforts, identifying emerging needs, refining programs, and strengthening accountability. This MIPA-driven approach resulted in enhanced organizational capacity, more responsive systems, and more sustainable, long-term impact across organizations serving communities throughout the U.S. South.

This study examined the cultural relevance and comprehensiveness of the WHOQOL-HIV-BREF among Black same-gender-loving (SGL) men. Although quality of life is increasingly recognized as a critical outcome in HIV care, limited research has assessed whether existing measures adequately capture the lived experiences of Black SGL men. Participants completed the WHOQOL-HIV-BREF regardless of their HIV status. Findings identify strengths, gaps, and opportunities to improve quality-of-life measurement, supporting more person-centered, culturally responsive HIV care and advancing health equity for Black SGL men.

This workshop is a continuation of the Trans for Trans Love Workshop presented at USCHA 2025 and creates a reflective space exploring intimacy, conflict, emotional wellness, and relational sustainability within Black T4T (trans for trans) communities. Through guided dialogue, storytelling, and community-centered discussion, presenters will examine how HIV stigma, advocacy labor, trauma, pleasure, and systems impacting Black trans lives shape relationships and emotional care. The session will feature couples of varying relationship dynamics, sero-statuses, and lived experiences connected to HIV advocacy, activism, and lived HIV experience. Participants will engage in discussions around accountability, communication, burnout, autonomy, and relational sustainability.

HIV is a global modality that primarily has impacted people of the African Diaspora (over 75%). Within the USA, approximately 40% of people with HIV identify as Black with an additional approximate 5% identifying as multiracial with Black as one of their identities.

The HIV response has overwhelming been led by white executives. Today, there are more Black executives than ever creating innovative solutions that uplift Black and other historically excluded communities.

This workshop will give space for recently placed Black executives to share their diverse pathways to the C-Suite and how they will ensure others can follow.

Despite persistent inequities, Black communities in the South continue to drive innovation, advocacy, and leadership in the HIV movement. This interactive workshop explores how Black-led organizations, advocates, and communities are building power, advancing justice, and creating new possibilities for the future of HIV leadership. Participants will examine lessons from Southern organizing traditions, community mobilization efforts, and Black-led leadership initiatives while exploring strategies for coalition-building, narrative change, and community engagement. Attendees will leave with practical tools for strengthening leadership, building community power, and advancing a more equitable and sustainable HIV movement.

Black women have repeatedly transformed communities, influenced movements, and built trust in spaces where institutions often struggled to do so. Yet many of the systems that shape funding, policy, healthcare, research, and leadership were not designed with Black women in mind. This interactive workshop moves beyond conversations about visibility and representation to explore how Black women cultivate influence, build collective power, and create sustainable pathways for leadership within systems that have historically excluded them. Participants will examine strategies for disrupting barriers, fostering succession, and designing the infrastructure needed to support future generations of trusted Black women leaders.

This workshop will examine HIV-related health inequities in Puerto Rico and the structural, social, and healthcare factors that contribute to disparities across the HIV prevention and care continuum. Participants will explore current trends in HIV diagnosis, treatment, viral suppression, and PrEP utilization, while considering the effects of poverty, stigma, colonialism, healthcare access barriers, and natural disasters on health outcomes. The session will highlight evidence-based and community-centered strategies to improve HIV prevention, treatment access, and health equity through collaboration among healthcare providers, community organizations, policymakers, researchers, and people affected by HIV.

This institute will equip older people living with HIV (50+) and younger lifetime survivors with practical skills in storytelling and policy advocacy. Participants will learn how to turn lived experience into clear, compelling stories that can shape federal, state, and local advocacy. Through interactive exercises and peer learning, attendees will connect their personal stories to key issues affecting aging with HIV and practice sharing them in a supportive setting. The session centers multigenerational voices and creates a welcoming space for those often underrepresented. Participants will leave feeling more confident and ready to share their stories and engage in advocacy.

This institute explores community-led approaches that address substance use and HIV-related healthcare disparities among vulnerable populations in resource-limited settings. Led from a community support worker perspective, the session highlights how grassroots engagement, peer support and culturally responsive outreach strengthen linkage to care, treatment adherence, and harm reduction outcomes. Participants will examine practical strategies used to bridge gaps in healthcare access for individuals affected by poverty, stigma, homelessness, mental health challenges, and substance use disorders. Emphasizing leadership community accountability, the institute demonstrates how local advocacy, lived experiences collaborative service delivery models can improve HIV equity and strengthen sustainable community health responses.

Evidence-based HIV interventions often face challenges when implemented in real-world settings due to organizational, workforce, and sustainability barriers. This interactive workshop introduces implementation science concepts through a practical HIV capacity-building lens. Participants will explore how implementation science can support the adoption, adaptation, implementation, and sustainability of HIV programs and services. Using implementation mapping exercises, and facilitated discussion, attendees will identify common implementation barriers and develop strategies to improve program effectiveness. This session translates implementation science into practical tools that can be applied by health departments, community-based organizations, and capacity-building providers to strengthen HIV prevention and care outcomes.

The Elton John AIDS Foundation (EJAF) funded five local community organizations in the US South who are testing and implementing new or enhanced models to improve access to quality, compassionate HIV prevention and care. The Center for Program Evaluation and Quality Improvement at Emory University was commissioned to assess the effectiveness of their programs when it comes to improving access to high-quality HIV care, focusing on three domains: grantee model performance, sustainability, and community engagement. This workshop will highlight common barriers to HIV care in the US South and innovative models that EJAF Community Access grantees employed to overcome them.

Matthew 25 AIDS Services launched a CDC-funded mobile health unit to address HIV, hepatitis C (HCV), and STI disparities across a 10-county rural region in Western Kentucky. Rural residents face significant barriers to care, including transportation deserts, provider shortages, stigma, and limited access to culturally competent services. This workshop will examine the development, implementation, and evaluation of a mobile health model designed to expand access to testing, prevention, education, and linkage-to-care services. Participants will learn practical strategies for building community partnerships, overcoming barriers to care, and implementing mobile health services in underserved communities.

Ending HIV in Indigenous communities requires more than clinical services-it requires strong relationships, community leadership, cultural strengths, and sustained investment in local capacity. This interactive Native Institute will bring together American Indian, Alaska Native, and Native Hawaiian leaders, clinicians, public health professionals, community health workers, and advocates to share progress, challenges, and emerging opportunities for ending HIV while addressing viral hepatitis, sexually transmitted infections, and related syndemics. Participants will hear updates on innovative Indigenous initiatives, including community storytelling and healing efforts, discuss lessons learned from communities across the country, and explore strategies for strengthening partnerships, workforce capacity, prevention, clinical care, and community engagement. The Native Institute concludes with an interactive skills-building workshop introducing strategies that promote trust, improve communication, and support safe, respectful interactions with patients, families, and community members.; ; Learning Objectives:; By the end of this session, participants will be able to: (1) Describe emerging opportunities and promising practices supporting HIV elimination in American Indian, Alaska Native, and Native Hawaiian communities. (2) Identify strategies for strengthening community partnerships, Indigenous leadership, and organizational capacity to improve health outcomes. (3) Apply foundational communication techniques that support culturally responsive, trauma-informed care.

This presentation examines the development of a community centered status neutral care model designed to strengthen the role of community based organizations within HIV prevention, treatment, sexual health, and supportive service delivery. The model creates a coordinated framework that connects community engagement, care navigation, prevention services, treatment services, and social support through a single system. The project seeks to improve access, reduce fragmentation, strengthen continuity of care, and build sustainable pathways for community organizations to contribute to improved health outcomes while maintaining their trusted role within the communities they serve.

Building for the Future: Organizational Needs Assessment & Sustainability Strategies is an energetic 60-minute workshop for HIV CBO leaders to strengthen organizational capacity and sustainability. Participants master three practical frameworks – SOAR for visioning, NOISE for action planning, and pivot strategies for crisis resilience – through interactive exercises. Participants leave with completed organizational assessments and actionable strategies for operational sustainability.; ; Learning Objectives:; By the end of this session, participants will be able to: Explain the purpose and best practices of organizational needs assessments and how they align with vision and mission. Apply the SOAR framework (Strengths, Opportunities, Aspirations, Results) to identify future-focused organizational strategies. Utilize the NOISE model (Needs, Opportunities, Improvements, Strengths, Exceptions) to develop quarterly action steps for a priority challenge. Analyze potential disruptions across four key sustainability pillars – funding, technology, workforce, and community health crises – and formulate strategies to pivot effectively. Commit to at least one action or practice they will implement in the next 90 days to strengthen organizational sustainability.

Despite national progress in Ending the Epidemic, Latino communities in the U.S. face a worsening and often invisible HIV crisis, compounded by false narratives that obscure their contributions, needs, and solutions. This interactive institute will help participants move from awareness to action by examining how Latino HIV inequities appear in local data, services, engagement, narratives, and policy priorities. Drawing on CLAFH’s “Latino HIV Cascading Disaster” framework and scholarship by Dr. Guilamo-Ramos and colleagues, participants will use case studies to map HIV prevention and treatment gaps and build a practical 90-day plan to strengthen visibility, access, community-led solutions, and cross-sector action.

This workshop examines what it takes to build HIV organizations capable of surviving long-term political, financial, and workforce instability. Grounded in lived leadership experience and organizational redesign, the session explores lessons learned from building and sustaining Black-led, community-rooted HIV and reproductive justice work in hostile environments. Participants will examine common organizational vulnerabilities-including burnout, funding fragility, crisis-driven operations, and weak succession planning-while exploring practical strategies for building resilient infrastructure, sustainable leadership models, workforce stability, and adaptive operational systems. The purpose of this workshop will help leaders strengthen organizational durability, protect mission integrity, and build institutions capable of sustaining long-term community impact.

For 45 years, Black communities have shaped the HIV response through organizing, advocacy, care, and leadership. Yet Black people continue to experience disproportionate HIV outcomes while facing attacks on healthcare access, voting rights, civil rights protections, and public health infrastructure. Led by United We Rise, this interactive session will examine the intersections of HIV, political power, and Black liberation. Through storytelling, dialogue, and reflection, participants will explore lessons from Black HIV activism, current threats to HIV prevention, care, and research, and opportunities to strengthen Black-led responses that center community power, intersectionality, and collective action.

Many organizations rely heavily on grant funding to sustain HIV prevention, care, and support services, yet long-term success requires a broader strategy. This workshop will introduce participants to the 340B Drug Pricing Program, including program eligibility, core requirements, and key compliance considerations for operating a successful and compliant 340B program. Participants will learn how organizations can strategically leverage 340B savings to strengthen organizational capacity, expand patient services, invest in workforce development and infrastructure, and improve financial sustainability. Through real-world examples and practical lessons learned, attendees will gain actionable strategies to maximize resources, maintain compliance, and build stronger, more resilient organizations.

The Central Florida Latinx HIV Taskforce is a community-led coalition that advances HIV prevention and care through culturally responsive outreach, education, testing, PrEP navigation, and whole-person linkage services. Initially established on October 18, 2018, in recognition of National Latinx AIDS Awareness Day, the Taskforce was created to address persistent gaps in HIV awareness, testing, prevention access, and culturally responsive care within Latinx communities. This workshop will share a replicable coalition model that integrates prevention, care, behavioral health, and community engagement to reduce stigma, strengthen access, and coordinate services across organizations.

This workshop introduces a transformative model for strengthening the capacity, sustainability, and resilience of community-based organizations serving people affected by HIV. Through practical tools and a case study, participants will assess organizational needs, develop a capacity-strengthening plan, and identify strategic partnerships to achieve their goals.

Built by Us, For Us: Housing, Dignity & Long-Term Care for Aging People Living with HIV

Presenter:
Andrew Gutierrez III, M.Ed, Director of Housing and Benefits, San Francisco AIDS Foundation

HIV/Aging with HIV: Fighting for Dignity in Care Setting

Presenters:
Terri L. Wilder, MSW
Jeff Berry
Timothy Jackson

People aging with HIV and older LGBTQ+ individuals continue to face discrimination in long-term care and home- and community-based services, including denial of care, premature discharge, and stigma. As more people age with HIV, the need for affirming services grows. This session highlights efforts to advance LGBTQ+ and HIV Long-Term Care Bills of Rights across states, including New York, Minnesota, and Illinois. Presenters will share lessons on coalition building, strategy, and community engagement. Participants will learn how these efforts can be adapted in other jurisdictions to strengthen protections, improve care access, and support more equitable, affirming care systems.

This interactive workshop explores how storytelling and authentic community engagement can strengthen HIV prevention efforts, increase trust, and improve health outcomes among communities disproportionately impacted by HIV. Using Damien Underground’s community-centered model serving Black, Brown, and gender-diverse individuals, participants will examine how lived experience, peer leadership, and relationship-building can transform traditional outreach into meaningful engagement. Through practical examples, interactive discussion, and lessons learned from the field, attendees will gain strategies to leverage storytelling as a tool to reduce stigma, increase service utilization, and create more responsive and affirming HIV prevention programs.

Health department HIV program staff face funding shifts, workforce turnover, and rapidly changing policies. This Institute will support health department leaders at all experience levels. New and emerging leaders will gain practical tools for navigating organizational change, communicating with community, and implementing policies that reflect best practices. Experienced leaders will deepen adaptive leadership strategies and share lessons learned through peer mentoring. Led by national workforce development experts, participants will engage in facilitated dialogue, skills-building exercises, and cross-jurisdictional exchange. Participants will leave with practical approaches to strengthen teams, support staff, and enhance community engagement in local HIV prevention efforts.

Health department HIV program staff face funding shifts, workforce turnover, and rapidly changing policies. This Institute will support health department leaders at all experience levels. New and emerging leaders will gain practical tools for navigating organizational change, communicating with community, and implementing policies that reflect best practices. Experienced leaders will deepen adaptive leadership strategies and share lessons learned through peer mentoring. Led by national workforce development experts, participants will engage in facilitated dialogue, skills-building exercises, and cross-jurisdictional exchange. Participants will leave with practical approaches to strengthen teams, support staff, and enhance community engagement in local HIV prevention efforts.

TBD

The purpose of this program is to integrate addiction-particularly methamphetamine use-into HIV prevention and care conversations, with a focus on Latinx LGBTQI+ communities.

Employment is often recognized as a determinant of HIV vulnerability, yet it is often framed as individual economic instability rather than shaped by structural exclusion. Guided by the Structural Vulnerability Framework and an intersectional lens, this study examines how employment barriers among Spanish-speaking immigrant Latino sexual minority men (LSMM) are shaped by systems of power.

In 2024, Black & Latina women accounted for 74% of new HIV diagnoses among women, yet women represented just 9% of PrEP users. Through an interactive workshop series, participants will gain practical insights and best practices for meaningful engagement with young Black and Latina women in HIV prevention efforts. Attendees will strengthen their ability to develop culturally responsive and holistic sexual health education strategies in community and clinical settings.

Successful HIV prevention goes beyond testing, beginning with a sexual health assessment classically termed the “sexual history.” By utilizing a sex-positive and trauma-informed lens, sexual health assessments can be reframed as conversations that help dismantle stigma and open doors to treating the whole person – mind, body, and community. By attending this institute, learners will gain knowledge and skills to conduct effective sexual health assessments that encourage open sexual health conversations and break down barriers to health promotion.

Learning Objectives:
1. Conduct a sexual health assessment through a sex-positive, trauma-informed lens. 2. Adapt sexual health conversational language to be without judgement or assumptions about behaviors, effectively assessing an individual’s priorities for their own sexual health. 3. Integrate health literacy best practices throughout sexual health conversations. 4. Identify opportunities to implement sexual health harm-reduction methods that prioritize client needs.

Pharmacist-initiated HIV PrEP has been implemented to varying degrees in the US, either through a qualified physician delegating prescribing authority to a pharmacist or by allowing pharmacists to independently initiate PrEP. Despite being implemented in some jurisdictions as early as 2015, little is known about the extent to which pharmacists prescribe PrEP in practice. Because pharmacists lack federally recognized provider status, services are often billed under a supervising physician’s national provider identifier (‘incident-to’ billing), which may mask the true landscape of pharmacist practice. This study describes PrEP-related services billed directly by pharmacists to characterize the current landscape of pharmacist-prescribed PrEP.

Sexually transmitted infections (STIs) constitute a significant risk factor for contracting HIV. Therefore, individuals who test STI positive but test HIV negative are a key population for HIV prevention interventions. Despite the availability of Pre-exposure prophylaxis (PrEP), linking people with positive for STIs to PrEP is a persistent challenge, particularly in communities serving vulnerable populations. At Cooperative Health in Columbia, South Carolina, we implemented a systematic workflow to identify STI-positive, HIV-negative patients who are eligible for linkage to comprehensive (i.e. behavioral and biomedical) HIV prevention services (LCPS), leveraging routine HIV testing data to bridge the gap between diagnosis and prevention.

This workshop explores how status neutral care models can move beyond traditional referral networks by creating coordinated systems that integrate community based organizations into prevention, treatment, sexual health, care navigation, and supportive services. Participants will examine how community organizations can serve as essential partners in care delivery, engagement, and retention while helping address barriers that affect health outcomes. The session highlights strategies for creating sustainable, community informed systems that improve access, continuity of care, and whole person health across diverse populations.

Blanca B Cookin and Catering has served the St. Louis community since 2008, creating spaces of trust, healing, and fellowship – particularly for transgender individuals and underserved populations. This workshop highlights how a community-rooted food business became a strategic outreach partner for the Community Wellness Project’s Gurlz Like Us program. By combining culturally affirming food experiences with HIV prevention and wellness services, this initiative increased participation in testing and linkage to care. Attendees will learn how food-centered engagement can bridge gaps between community members and the organizations designed to serve them.

Treatment Survey: insights into rapid antiretroviral therapy initiation patterns and perceptions across a global population of PWH

This presentation examines the effectiveness of mail in HIV and STI testing compared with traditional laboratory based testing models, including on site and satellite testing locations. As organizations seek to reduce barriers to prevention and sexual health services, understanding the impact of testing modality on patient engagement, completion rates, linkage to care, and retention is increasingly important. This session explores how different testing approaches influence patient behavior and discusses the role of mail in testing within status neutral care models designed to expand access and improve continuity of care.

This interactive workshop demonstrates how storytelling and community engagement and leadership can make technical aspects of the HIV response visible, understandable, and accountable to those most affected. Using the co-created “River of Network Detection and Response (NDR)” graphic and animation from Atlanta as a case study, participants will learn how community leaders and people with lived experience translated a complex surveillance process into an accessible, narrative tool. Through hands-on activities, attendees practice converting complex processes from their own work into community-grounded stories. The session centers community leadership and storytelling as essential forces for accountability and for advancing the HIV response.

The PrEPárate campaign successfully engaged Latine LGBTQ+ communities through culturally tailored social marketing. Central to its evolution is the OSMe Buddy, a 24/7 digital navigation program. This presentation tells the story of how this tool was developed through a unique partnership between the Chicago Queer Latine Collaborative (CQLC NFP), academic researchers, and Versante, a values-based tech firm. By dismantling traditional silos and blending community storytelling with technological innovation, the OSMe Buddy empowers users to navigate pre-exposure prophylaxis (PrEP) and whole-person health resources.

The HIV decriminalization movement is at a critical juncture. While advocates have secured significant victories through legislative reform, repeal efforts, strategic litigation, and coalition building, criminalization continues to evolve alongside broader punitive responses to public health and social inequality. This moderated panel discussion will examine current legal and policy trends, emerging threats, and innovative advocacy strategies shaping HIV decriminalization efforts nationwide. Drawing on recent state campaigns and national advocacy work, panelists will discuss successful approaches, persistent challenges, and lessons learned from both victories and setbacks. Participants will gain practical tools for advancing decriminalization and health justice in their communities.

This workshop seeks to educate women on HIV prevention by using hair as a metaphor for sexual health and wellness. In this workshop, gender-based and racial gendered disparities and specific barriers will be highlighted. Specifically, detangling the roots will review HIV prevention history among women, biomedical technology options, barriers to care, and community-based strategies for overcoming barriers to care. This workshop will be conducted using a guided conversation as its format, where education and skills will be weaved throughout an interactive conversation amongst and for women.

Black women living with HIV (BWLWH) experience intersecting social and structural stressors, including racism, HIV-related stigma, trauma exposure, and gender-based discrimination, that contribute to mental and behavioral health disparities. HIV research has historically emphasized deficit- and risk-based frameworks, with less attention given to psychosocial strengths that may support adaptation and well-being over time. The present study examined psychosocial factors to identify protective factors and inform interventions aimed at enhancing coping, support, and overall well-being among BWLWH. This study investigated whether chronological age and years since HIV diagnosis predicted baseline levels and longitudinal trajectories of psychosocial strengths across repeated study visits.

This interactive workshop explores how HIV organizing must move beyond siloed resilience toward cross-movement solidarity as a path to collective liberation. Public health crises, burnout, and austerity threaten our movement. Disability Justice (DJ) offers critical tools for sustaining collective action and liberation. Participants new to or experienced with DJ will examine HIV-related complexities such as episodic disability, aging, and complex chronic illness as movement issues that shape participation, leadership, and progress. Through collaborative activities, attendees will identify emerging needs and strategies for rethinking and building accessible and sustainable organizing spaces that intentionally include those too often excluded from decision-making tables.

What happens when PWH become the storytellers of the movement, and when CQM intentionally invests in trust, representation, and human connection?

Ending the interconnected epidemics of HIV, STIs, and HCV requires more than any single agency can offer alone. Doing so requires integrated strategies, shared accountability, and partnerships across public health, behavioral health, housing, and community. This workshop presents California’s Integrated Statewide HIV/STI/HCV Strategic Plan and Implementation Blueprint as a replicable model for jurisdictions across the country. Grounded in a syndemic framework and six social determinants of health – racial equity, economic justice, health access, housing first, stigma free, and substance use and mental health – this approach offers practical lessons for jurisdictions ready to move beyond siloed epidemic response.

Successful HIV prevention goes beyond testing, beginning with a sexual health assessment classically termed the “sexual history.” By utilizing a sex-positive and trauma-informed lens, sexual health assessments can be reframed as conversations that help dismantle stigmas and open doors to treating the whole person – mind, body, and community. By attending this institute, learners will gain knowledge and skills to conduct effective sexual health assessments that encourage open sexual health conversations and break down barriers to health promotion. Learners will be equipped with tools that allow for rapid deployment in their day-to-day work and dissemination amongst their own teams.

This service-provider-focused institute will highlight local, state, and federal opportunities to improve care for people aging with HIV. The HIV and Aging service response requires increased collaboration to honor those aging with HIV. Historically, Aging services and the HIV response have multiple similarities. Communities stepped up when the systems fell short, and we shared resources to address service gaps. With increasing needs and diminishing funding, collaboration is more critical than ever. Our nation’s aging demographic shift provides a unique opportunity to align HIV and Aging service spaces. By attending this institute, providers will improve their ability to support and center community members’ power, create innovative care systems, and advocate for structural change. [Description carried forward from the 2024 USCHA program – confirm with presenters that it still reflects the 2026 session.]; ; Learning Objectives:; 1. Identify local, state, and federal opportunities to strengthen care and collaboration for people aging with HIV.; 2. Describe the historical parallels between the Aging services network and the HIV response, and how they can inform shared strategies.; 3. Explain how diminishing funding and shifting demographics create both challenges and opportunities for aligning HIV and Aging service systems.; 4. Apply strategies to center community power and advocate for structural change within their own organizations.; [DRAFT – no 2026 learning objectives were provided; these were written from the institute description and need presenter confirmation.]

This institute is an opportunity to explore the political power inherent in queer sex. This session will help participants better understand how the personal is political, including our sex lives. Queer sex and Black and brown bodies are criminalized and pathologized. When we choose to use our bodies to pursue pleasure it is a radical act. Our sex is political, provocative, and a form of mobilization.

We’ll explore how to better articulate the value and meaning of queer sex and why it matters in the HIV response. Prioritizing queer sex can improve sexual health, mental health and quality of life.

In this insightful breakout session, delve into the complexities and opportunities of third-party billing systems for HIV prevention programs and services, including the utilization of 340B rebate services. Participants will gain expertise in the operational aspects of third-party billing, exploring strategies to enhance revenue streams and financial sustainability for HIV prevention efforts. This session will also address common challenges and provide solutions for navigating the regulatory and compliance landscape associated with 340B and other billing systems.; ; Learning Objectives:; By the end of this training, participants will: Understand the Grant Cycle’s importance to grant compliance. Understand the components of Grants Management. Understand Organizational Budgets. Identify the usages of third-party billing systems to maximize budgets and expand services.

The 45-year history of the HIV movement highlights the necessity of collaborative, community-informed programming. However, ongoing shifts in federal and state governments are fundamentally altering the public health infrastructure we rely upon. Led by AIDS United, this 3-hour interactive institute explores how HIV service organizations can maintain business continuity and robust programming despite these changes. Attendees will learn to navigate policy shifts, leverage novel fundraising and partnerships, implement evidence-informed interventions, and craft effective messaging to protect clients, reassure the public, and ensure long-term organizational sustainability in an unpredictable landscape.

Although rapid ART initiation is recommended across major HIV treatment guidelines, implementation remains inconsistent. This workshop explores practical strategies for operationalizing rapid ART initiation while helping strengthen systems that support continuous, person-centered engagement in care.

This workshop will explore the importance of incorporating marketing and communication strategies into public health messaging and broad community engagement campaigns. We will walk participants through the development of localized campaigns in 5 US-based cities (Atlanta, GA; Boston, MA; Pittsburgh, PA; Rochester, NY; and Seattle, WA. This workshop will take participants through the journey of creating localized campaigns, using Meta platforms (Facebook and Instagram) focusing on affordability, tools for both targeting and data collection, performance in driving engagement, and platform data features. A focus will be on the creative development process which included community members at each step.

This workshop explores how storytelling within faith spaces can reduce HIV stigma, increase engagement, and create healing-centered conversations within Black heterosexual cisgender communities. Through lived experience, community dialogue, and culturel advocacy, participants will examine the impact of church hurt, silence, and stigma while identifying opportunities for church healing, education, and hope. The session highlights how trusted faith leaders, community advocates, and people living with HIV can work together to normalize HIV conversations, strengthen community trust, and empower individuals to move from isolation to advocacy. Attendees will leave with practical strategies for engagement, storytelling, HIV advocacy rooted in compassion and truth.

The purpose of this presentation is to examine the under utilization of school-based HIV/STI prevention and testing services among Montgomery County Public Schools high school students. Although six high schools offer free, confidential, place-based health and wellness services, 2024 STI screening data suggest a gap between access and student utilization. This gap is significant given that 4,111 people are living with HIV in Montgomery County, 13% remain undiagnosed, and youth ages 13-24 account for 2.6% of state HIV cases in the county. The presentation explores barriers to care and strategies to strengthen prevention engagement.

HIV/AIDS convenings have played a critical role in advancing knowledge and driving progress to end the HIV epidemic. As we celebrate “The HIV Movement at 45,” we must also ask what the future requires. Traditional convening models have prioritized information sharing but fall short of translating learning into action. The SUSTAIN Center’s Taking Action Together (TAT) Summit re-imagined HIV convenings by centering connection, healing, reflection, and action. This workshop will: 1) discuss lessons learned from TAT, 2) introduce the Root.Act.Rise. Framework that guided planning and implementation, and 3) share practical tools for designing future convenings.

Emory University’s COMPASS Coordinating Center (ECCC) provides organizational capacity building through grantmaking, organizational infrastructure training, and technical assistance. ECCC aims to end the HIV epidemic in the South by improving access to high quality services and building sustainable organizations. This PoWER Evaluation training is designed to increase organizational capacity around evaluation planning and collecting, analyzing, and/or reporting data. Participants will learn ways to improve programs and show impact to organization leadership and funders through examples, case studies, and group activities. Participants will leave with evaluation tools. resources, and access to a free evaluation module.

This 90-minute workshop presents new advances in HIV vaccine and cure science and examines what these breakthroughs mean for communities most impacted by the epidemic. Drawing on research from the HIV Vaccine Trials Network (HVTN), Duke Human Vaccine Institute, and Oregon Health & Science University’s Vaccine and Gene Therapy Institute, the session bridges laboratory discovery and community impact. Featuring scientists at the leading edge of preventive vaccine development and HIV cure research, alongside a community engagement specialist, it demystifies complex science, contextualizes the urgency of existing prevention tools, and elevates community voices in shaping the path toward ending HIV.

Many health departments, clinical providers, and community-based organizations face challenges implementing research-backed interventions for HIV prevention, care, and treatment. Implementation science (IS) is a structured approach to measuring and addressing these challenges, but many HIV workforce professionals have not received training on how IS frameworks can be applied to improve service outcomes in their settings. This institute seeks to equip participants with skills to increase the uptake and sustainability of interventions, and ensure these interventions are implemented as intended, by introducing core IS concepts and two widely-used frameworks, Consolidated Framework for Implementation Research and Reach, Effectiveness, Adoption, Implementation, and Maintenance.

The RISE (Relational, Integrated, Socio-Ecological) Infant Feeding Framework was developed to address implementation challenges arising from evolving HIV infant feeding guidelines. Although evidence now supports informed infant feeding decisions for people with HIV, translation into practiceremainsinconsistent. Through a scoping review of 56 studies and theoretical synthesis, RISEidentifiesindividual, interpersonal, organizational, community, and societal influences on infant feeding decisions, with trust, equity, and justice as cross-cutting principles. The framework provides a roadmap for provider education, policy development, workforce training, implementation strategies, systems-level interventions, and quality improvement efforts that supportequitable, evidence-based care.

This workshop, led by M. Keith Rawlings, MD (Chair, Internal Medicine/HIV Section, National Medical Association), examines the persistent gap between CDC-recommended routine HIV testing guidelines and actual clinical practice, revealing striking disparities in testing and PrEP access across age, race, gender, and geography — particularly affecting Black and Hispanic communities and the Southern United States. The session also addresses critical workforce shortages and the underrepresentation of Black and Hispanic providers in HIV care, before shifting to practical guidance on how clinicians can serve as health advocates by engaging policymakers, building community coalitions, and leveraging their position at the intersection of clinical practice and community health equity.

Structural barriers, fragmented data systems, and stigma drive persistent gaps in HIV outcomes that disproportionately affect Black, Latino, and LGBTQ+ communities, particularly in the South. Conversely, PEPFAR has achieved remarkable progress in global HIV epidemic control through bold, data-driven, and community-led innovations that were developed, funded, and scaled by U.S. leadership; presenting an opportunity to apply lessons learned to strengthen domestic HIV programming. This workshop bridges the global and domestic HIV response by introducing HRSA’s HIV/AIDS Bureau implementation science framework to adapt PEPFAR innovations, while centering communities and closing persistent gaps in domestic HIV prevention, care, and treatment.

Preserving and advancing supportive policy is critical to ensuring access to HIV prevention in the U.S. It takes advocates, funders, policymakers, and implementing partners all pulling in the same direction. But how do we know if it is working? This workshop presents findings from an evaluation of the Elton John AIDS Foundation’s grantmaking for advocacy and policy change to improve PrEP access in the U.S., including investments in coalition-building, policy advocacy, and implementation. Representatives from Equality Federation, Georgia Equality, PrEP4All and the RxEACH Initiative, funded by EJAF to do this work, – will share implementation perspectives alongside the evaluation findings.

Build Up (BU) is an AIDS Institute-funded LGBTQ+ health and human services grant program designed to strengthen HIV prevention engagement, behavioral wellness, housing stability, and access to supportive services in Central Harlem, East Harlem, and the South Bronx. The program prioritizes Black/African American and Hispanic/Latinx LGBTQ+ communities, gay men and other men who have sex with men, transgender women, gender nonconforming individuals, and House/Ballroom community members. BU addresses social determinants of health through integrated Health Promotion, Behavioral Health, and Housing Navigation within a trauma-informed, harm reduction, health literacy, and LGBTQ+-affirming whole-person framework to improve access, trust, and continuity of care.

Meaningful youth engagement is essential to ending the HIV epidemic, yet research structures often limit impact through late-stage consultation, inconsistent compensation, and lack of sustained integration into decision-making. These gaps hinder translation of community insight into real-world HIV prevention and care. The Institute on Digital Health and Innovation (IDHI) developed the Subject Matter Research Consultant (SMRC) model to operationalize youth engagement as a sustained, workforce-integrated component of HIV research. This presentation describes the implementation of the SMRC model and its role in strengthening community-driven, youth-centered research systems.

“Who are we excluding from our decision making tables, what are losing?” This interactive workshop shares how one mentor elevated a peer survivor living with HIV to organizational leadership. In February 2008, Denise Drayton, Director of Education and Prevention at Exponents Inc., hired Victor Velazquez, fresh from recovery and incarceration. Denise mentored Victor through a proven four phase model: HIRE (see the value), ONBOARD (build safety), DEVELOP (build capacity), ELEVATE (share power). By 2014, when Denise retired, Victor became Director of Training and Recruitment. This workshop teaches what Denise knew: peer leadership is not a risk. It is a foundation.

This workshop examines how PrEP in Black America’s Advancing the Movement: HIV Prevention Research Agenda is moving from vision to implementation through its HIV Funding Impact Tracker. The session will connect the Agenda’s priorities: direct funding, community leadership, PrEP education, workforce empowerment, and policy reform to a real-time accountability tool documenting funding cuts, service disruptions, and early warning signs affecting Black communities (PrEP in Black America, 2023; Black Public Health Academy, 2025).

This workshop explores how self-advocacy and community-centered education can disrupt the stigma that continues to surround HIV, AIDS, and PrEP, especially in Black and Brown communities. Stigma is often the root barrier to healing, testing, and access to care. Too often, conversations are clouded by shame, silence, and misinformation. As sexual health educators and advocates, we are uniquely positioned to shift that narrative.

This workshop explores how Dandelions, Inc. is building a survivor-governed infrastructure that strengthens organizational sustainability, leadership development, and community accountability among Lifetime Survivors of HIV. Participants will examine the Governance, Accountability, Advisory, and Leadership (GAAL) framework, a model designed to move directly impacted communities from participation to governance. Through examples of shared leadership, participatory philanthropy, and leadership succession planning, the session demonstrates how organizations can build resilient structures that center lived expertise, strengthen workforce development, and create long-term capacity for community-led decision-making and movement sustainability.

Ribbon proposes an interactive Institute that elevates the lived experiences of people living with HIV through storytelling as a tool for leadership, advocacy, and community engagement. Rooted in decades of HIV leadership at local, state, and national levels, this session explores how personal narratives inspire action, influence systems, and strengthen community connections. Through guided discussions, reflection activities, small-group exercises, scenario planning, and an intergenerational panel of leaders living with HIV, attendees will gain practical tools to strengthen peer leadership, community engagement, systems navigation, and long-term movement sustainability within HIV-related spaces nationally

We explore how storytelling can be used as a strategic tool to strengthen HIV advocacy, deepen community trust, and increase engagement among communities most impacted by HIV. Centering Black communities, LGBTQ+ people, transgender people, and grassroots organizers, the session examines how lived experience can move beyond visibility & become a catalyst for leadership development, mobilization, and systems accountability. Participants will learn practical strategies for ethical storytelling, digital engagement, and community-centered communication while exploring ways to avoid tokenization and trauma exploitation. The workshop aims to equip attendees with actionable tools to transform narrative power into sustainable advocacy and measurable community impact

This session examines the throughline between survival sex work economies and the nonprofit industrial complex and how both systems shape power, legitimacy, and leadership for Black and Brown trans people. Drawing from lived experience, movement history, and current organizing, it offers a political analysis of how respectability politics, philanthropy, legal systems, and organizational hierarchies reproduce harm while relying on the labor of those most exposed to violence and poverty. Grounded in the Trans Agenda for Liberation, participants will develop shared language, identify extractive leadership pipelines, and build strategies rooted in accountability, safety, and shared power toward collective liberation.

Presenters:

• Moderator: Dr. Dora Martinez, MD, FAAFP, AAHIVS- Regional Medical Director, North America Medical Affairs
• Co-Moderator: Von Biggs, Community Liaison, HIV Community Engagement | Health Equity Strategist

ViiV Healthcare Panelist:

• Dr. Dainielle J. Fox, PharmD, AAHIVP

Panelists:

• Garo Kiledjian, Founder SGM Alliance
• Marie Niles, Founder Bee HIV+ Foundation
• Marz Albarran, Albany Damien Center Board Vice President

This workshop will explore how community voices can shape the future of HIV research, prevention, care, and innovation. Through expert perspectives, community dialogue, and interactive discussions, participants will examine how meaningful engagement can influence research priorities, care models, and health outcomes. Building on the Progress Made Personal (PMP) experience introduced at AIDS 2026, the session will highlight how personal experiences and community insights can drive innovation, advance health equity, and improve treatment-related quality of life. The workshop will demonstrate the impact of long-acting therapies beyond clinical efficacy, emphasizing the role of freedom, choice, and quality of life in person-centered HIV care. Attendees will leave with practical insights on strengthening collaboration among providers, community leaders, researchers, and people impacted by HIV while advancing more equitable and sustainable approaches to prevention and treatment.

Black same-gender-loving men (BSGLM) and Black men who have sex with men (BMSM) continue to experience disproportionate rates of HIV, trauma exposure, substance use, and mental health challenges. Yet many frontline providers receive limited preparation to address these intersecting needs. This presentation shares findings from a qualitative study exploring the experiences of Black MSM service providers working in HIV prevention and behavioral health settings. Participants discuss training gaps, workforce challenges, lived experience, trauma-informed care, and culturally responsive practice. Attendees will gain actionable strategies to strengthen provider preparedness, improve client engagement, and enhance health equity for Black sexual minority communities.

Meaningful Involvement of People Living with HIV (MIPA) affirms that those most impacted is central to every level of HIV policy, funding, services, and decision-making-not as tokens, but as leaders. Yet many organizing spaces are move away from this principle as challenges arise, weakening authentic community leadership. This session explores that shift and its impact on people living with HIV, particularly cis and trans women, gender-diverse and transgender communities. Through storytelling and dialogue, participants what is gained by restoring MIPA as a practice of power-sharing, accountability, and liberation, ensuring HIV responses remain led by and for people living with HIV.

“This workshop builds communal readiness as a framework for strengthening organizational capacity. Communal readiness describes the shared trust and efficacy that determine whether organizations can carry the work together. An organization’s internal life shows up in the interaction between a provider and a patient, in the moment a staff member decides whether to stay, and in the care that genuinely reaches the people it was built to serve. Together, participants assess their organization’s communal readiness and develop practical strategies to strengthen it. This workshop returns communal readiness to where it has always belonged – inside the organizations sustaining the movement.

In 2024-2025, CAN Community Health (CAN) implemented Our Way Forward, an initiative to create an internal Ending the Syndemics (EtS) Plan. Informed by staff, patients, community leaders, and other stakeholders, Our Way Forward established a bold organizational strategy to provide quality, highly-impactful, patient-centered prevention and care services that directly support local and national EtS goals in the communities CAN serves, regardless of funding source. This interactive workshop will share the step-by-step process used to complete Our Way Forward, including simple, effective community engagement activities, qualitative data analysis, stakeholder-informed priority setting, and a celebratory communication plan.”

The future of the HIV movement depends on organizations and leaders that can sustain themselves through change, uncertainty, and ongoing challenges. Yet many HIV organizations struggle with burnout, turnover, organizational stress, and leadership fatigue. This interactive institute explores healing-centered leadership as a strategy for building resilient organizations, stronger teams, and sustainable movements. Participants will examine how healing, trust, accountability, culture, and shared leadership contribute to long-term effectiveness and community impact. Through practical tools, reflection, and real-world examples, attendees will develop strategies to strengthen leadership, support teams, and sustain mission-driven work over time.

This interactive workshop focuses on the assessment and management of cardiovascular disease (CVD) risk in people living with HIV (PWLH). Participants will explore the epidemiology and pathophysiologic mechanisms underlying elevated CVD risk in this population, review both traditional and HIV-specific risk factors (viral load, CD4 count, antiretroviral therapy), and apply guideline-driven strategies, including 2026 ACC/AHA and DHHS recommendations, plus newer tools such as PREVENT-ASCVD and emerging biomarkers (Lipoprotein(a), ApoB, CAC, hsCRP).

Learning Objectives:
1. Describe the epidemiology and pathophysiologic mechanisms contributing to elevated cardiovascular disease risk in PWLH. 2. Identify traditional and HIV-specific cardiovascular risk factors, including antiretroviral therapy-related effects. 3. Apply current ACC/AHA and DHHS guideline recommendations to cardiovascular risk stratification, using validated risk calculators. 4. Describe emerging cardiovascular risk markers to refine risk assessment for PWLH. 5. Select appropriate lipid-lowering and non-statin therapies for primary and secondary prevention of cardiovascular disease in people with HIV.

The audience will review/practice LA ARV injection technique using a demonstration kitfor cabotegravir and lenacapavir. Attendees will review injection sites, pre and post-injection education, and publicly-available resources for future hands-on trainings. Experienced faculty will answer questions, observe injection technique, and discuss injection methods. Attendees will discuss real-world examples of clinic implementation protocols for LA ARV injections for HIV treatment and prevention. Clinic protocol details will include workflows for insurance coverage and medication acquisition, scheduling, appointment reminders, medication windows, communication with health teams, referral processes, collaborations with community organizations, aspects of patient messaging, and available resources to build out workflows.

Learning Objectives:
Participants will demonstrate correct LA ARV injection technique for cabotegravir and lenacapavir. Attendees will leave with reviewed publicly-available resources for hands-on training replication. Clinic staff will identify actionable workflows adaptable to their own settings for LA ARV implementation, including insurance, scheduling, and patient communication protocols.

Strong organizations are the foundation of effective HIV prevention. The HIV Prevention CBA Exchange is an interactive three-hour institute designed to connect community-based organizations, health departments, and other HIV prevention professionals with the CDC-funded HIV Prevention Capacity Building Assistance (CBA) Provider Network. Participants will gain an understanding of the HIV Prevention CBA Provider Network, learn about the unique expertise and services offered by each CDC-funded CBA provider, and explore the wide range of no-cost training, technical assistance, and capacity-building resources available to strengthen organizations and the HIV prevention workforce. Through presentations from CBA providers, peer-to-peer discussions featuring organizations that have successfully leveraged technical assistance, and practical guidance on accessing services, attendees will gain valuable insights into how the CBA Provider Network can support their organization’s goals. Whether organizations are looking to strengthen programs, improve organizational systems, enhance workforce capacity, implement evidence-based strategies, or address emerging challenges, this institute will provide participants with the knowledge, connections, and resources needed to access the right support at the right time.

Routine opt-out HIV screening can serve as a critical component of a status-neutral, whole-person approach to Ending the HIV Epidemic. This workshop will explore how healthcare organizations and community partners are leveraging HIV screening infrastructure to identify people with newly diagnosed HIV, previously diagnosed and out of care, and individuals eligible for linkage to HIV prevention services.

Through presentations from leaders representing a hospital emergency department within a large healthcare system, a community health center, and a 40-site federally qualified health center, participants will learn how diverse partners have adapted HIV screening programs to meet the needs of their communities. Panelists will share implementation strategies, partnership approaches, program outcomes, and lessons learned from integrating lab, EMR, leadership and linkage resources to strengthen HIV screening and linkage to HIV care and HIV prevention services.

What are the conversations for People Living with HIV that only the caucus can have? Our work serves the community; we are a bridge of understanding, engagement, and self-determination. To align with the USCHA theme for this year, we want to highlight our lived experience as people aging with HIV, our future where building and sharing intersectional power with emerging leaders enhances our quality of life, and the actions we will take to get to the liberation we fight for in our policy and community engagement.

TLGBTQ+ individuals, people living with HIV and individuals from diverse backgrounds are disproportionately impacted by HIV and Homelessness. Facing barriers to HIV care, gender affirming care, housing, mental health services, and employment Life Is Work strive to bridge gaps through programming that address not only accessibility, but sustainability that supports community holistically. This workshop will cover best practices to enhance housing sustainability and client engagement to support HIV and prevention efforts.

This workshop explores how nonprofit organizations, local government, private developers, and community stakeholders can work together to preserve affordability and health stability during periods of rapid neighborhood growth. Using a Dallas-based case study, presenters will share lessons from an eight-year effort that aligned redevelopment, affordable housing, supportive housing, and community planning to create inclusive growth. Participants will learn how housing stability, access to opportunity, and continuity of care can be protected through proactive partnerships, strategic development, and community-centered planning that benefits both existing residents and future generations.

The GMHC Testing Center provides clients with free HIV and STI testing at a community-based organization (CBO). In 2025, the Testing Center performed thousands of HIV and STI tests. As a non-clinical testing site, client information, laboratory orders, and referral tracking need integration without the infrastructure of a clinical institution. Historically, the Testing Center utilized paper charts and laboratory requisitions and a digital filing system to organize client records. In May 2026, following a continuous quality improvement (CQI) project, the Testing Center began using the electronic medical record system (EMR) AWARDS to strengthen organizational infrastructure and centralize client records.

For millions of Americans, health insurance fails to deliver affordable HIV prevention and care. This workshop examines how plan design – from rising costs to insurer practices – creates hidden barriers despite coverage. This workshop examines how insurance structures create barriers for people living with and at risk for HIV, even when they have coverage. Drawing on original national research, presenters explore rising premiums and out-of-pocket costs, then dive into three HIV-specific case studies: gaps in how plans document no-cost PrEP coverage, copay accumulator policies, and a tiering of HIV treatment medications on prescription drug formularies.

Learning Objectives:
By the end of this workshop, participants will be able to:

* Identify how insurance plan design creates hidden barriers to HIV prevention and treatment access, even for insured individuals.
* Understand how three specific insurer practices – inadequate documentation of no-cost PrEP coverage, copay accumulator adjustment programs, and high-tier placement of antiretroviral medications – drive up costs and discourage utilization.
* Apply original national research findings on insurance affordability trends affecting people living with and at risk for HIV.
* Use practical knowledge in advocacy, navigation, and policy efforts to hold insurers accountable and close access gaps for historically underserved communities.

This institute affirms that in order to lead effectively, non-white leaders must have the adequate tools and opportunities to hone their leadership journey. This requires a collective investment from the broader public health community that prepares minority leaders to assume greater autonomy and positional authority. Using its Minority Leadership Program (MLP) and its Emerging Community Leaders Program (ECLP) as national models, NASTAD will lead an institute that demonstrates effective frameworks that can be leveraged to invest in the leadership capacity of non-white leaders working in HIV, hepatitis, and harm reduction spaces.

This iPoster addresses the structural invisibility of women living with HIV (WLWH) within women’s health spaces – in research agendas, clinical programs, and national policy. Presented by two Black women with HIV who are also Medical Social Workers and HIV Health Equity Leads, this session draws on local San Diego epidemiological data, national surveillance, and lived experience to document how WLWH are absent where they should be centered. It calls on researchers, clinicians, and community partners to make WLWH not just subjects – but agenda-shapers. The much higher rates of HIV in black women are clearly shown in table.

In an effort to address a rising tide of violence against the older LGBTQ+/HIV community, the Illinois Public Health Association, in collaboration with AgeLinc (Area Agency on Aging for Lincolnland), has launched a new LGBTQ+ Older Adult Violence Prevention Program, “OUTSafe.”

The KISS & TELL Program uses storytelling, peer leadership, and community engagement to strengthen cross-generational conversations about HIV prevention and treatment, reproductive health, and wellness across the lifespan. Grounded in the community-led KISS & TELL documentary, this interactive institute equips participants with practical skills to facilitate dialogue, address stigma, build trust, and navigate individuals into prevention, care, and support services. Through guided exercises, case studies, role-play, and community mapping activities, participants will learn how lived experiences can drive education, leadership development, advocacy, and action while centering pleasure and the voices of Black Women who are disproportionately impacted by HIV.

Long-acting injectable (LAI) medicines represent an important advancement in HIV prevention and treatment. However, realizing their full potential in improving HIV care outcomes requires more than simply the availability of new biomedical options. Successful implementation will depend on our ability to translate innovation into real-world practice across diverse communities, healthcare settings, and populations. This interactive session will bring together experts and participants to explore practical strategies for moving from LAI availability to successful and equitable implementation. Rather than a traditional panel discussion, this session is designed for healthcare providers as an interactive implementation studio. Attendees will engage with experts in facilitated roundtable discussions focused on real-world implementation challenges, opportunities, and solutions

Stigmatizing language around HIV and other aspects of identity remains a persistent barrier to care. Based on decades of anecdotal evidence from women reporting stigmatizing language in healthcare settings, The Well Project, along with a group of expert advisors, conducted a web-based survey to better understand its prevalence and impact.

This interactive workshop will highlight traditional Hawaiian cultural and healing approaches to health for individuals living with HIV experiencing substance use, mental health and isolation.Native Hawaiian practices are rooted in balance, spirituality, community connections, and restoring harmony between mind, body, family, land, and ancestors. While ancient Hawaiians did not use the western term substance use disorders (SUD) or mental health, many traditional practices align closely with trauma healing, behavioral recovery, emotional regulation, and community reintegration.Native Hawaiian Cultural practices serve as an essential base for both delivering and accessing care to our native Hawaiian and local communities.

The goal of this 3-hour Institute is to move beyond clinical jargon and give attendees from diverse backgrounds practical, plain-language science they can actually use to live healthier lives, regardless of their HIV status.; ; Learning Objectives:; Move beyond clinical jargon to give attendees practical, plain-language science they can use to live healthier lives, regardless of HIV status. Discuss healthcare and wellness of people living with HIV in lay medical terms.

Opt-out HIV testing has been widely adopted in emergency department (ED) settings to increase early diagnosis; however, workflows are often designed around assumptions of linguistic and cultural neutrality. For Spanish-speaking patients, language discordance and structurally constrained communication can significantly shape both testing acceptance and successful linkage to HIV care. This poster describes an HIV opt-out testing initiative implemented at St. Joseph’s Hospital and Medical Center in Phoenix, Arizona, funded by Gilead’s FOCUS Program, drawing on frontline experience across the program continuum. The poster examines how nurses operationalize opt-out HIV testing with Spanish-speaking patients within the constraints of ED workflows.

The Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) recommends HIV screening for patients ≥13 years. Parts of Metro Atlanta have HIV+ rates at 8-times the national average. Adolescents are the least likely group to know their HIV status and have the lowest rate of linkage to care. In July 2023, Children’s Healthcare of Atlanta (Children’s) implemented an opt-out HIV testing initiative in its emergency departments (ED) for patients ≥13 years undergoing venipuncture to increase testing rates. In August 2025, comprehensive preventative services (CPS) were implemented, as an additional layer to augment the impact of this Children’s opt-out HIV care model.

Generation Z is not the future of public health; we are already shaping it. Across the field, Gen Z professionals are leading organizations, advancing scholarship, influencing health communications, building innovative programs, and redefining community engagement. Yet many young professionals continue to navigate workplace cultures and leadership structures designed before their generation entered the workforce. This interactive workshop will explore how Gen Z leaders are successfully advancing their careers while balancing authenticity, innovation, and professional credibility. Participants will gain practical strategies for leadership development, professional growth, and maximizing their impact in a multi-generational public health workforce.

This session examines how overlapping systems of immigration precarity, displacement trauma, racism, homophobia, transphobia, and HIV-related stigma shape the health and wellbeing of LGBTIQ immigrants in the United States. Centering storytelling and community leadership, the session highlights how queer immigrants build informal care networks, peer support systems, and community-led HIV response strategies when formal systems fail. The purpose is to elevate lived experience as expertise, explore immigration as a critical public health determinant, and equip HIV practitioners, researchers, and advocates with trauma-informed, culturally responsive approaches for improving prevention, care engagement, and whole-person health outcomes for immigrant LGBTQ communities.

Federal and state laws work to ensure access to preventive services for many conditions, including HIV, viral hepatitis, STDs, and tuberculosis. PIX, a cooperative agreement between CDC and NNPHI, conducted policy mapping that catalogs state statutes and regulations in effect as of April 2026 that mandate state coverage of preventive services recommended by USPSTF, ACIP, and HRSA for women and for children and youth, PrEP access, and prenatal or perinatal screenings for infectious diseases, and any cost sharing prohibitions.This poster will display this research in accessible, color-coded maps and include a QR code to access the publicly available interactive format.

Rural HIV prevention and care planning requires more than statewide indicators. It requires place-based data that show where people live, where services exist, and where transportation, workforce, hospital vulnerability, and syndemic risks create barriers to access. Community Education Group has developed rural data and mapping approaches that layer HIV indicators, service locations, provider buffers, Ending the HIV Epidemic jurisdictions, rural vulnerability, and syndemic risk. This interactive workshop will show how data visualization and partner interpretation can identify service gaps, guide outreach strategies, strengthen partnerships, and translate evidence into practical rural HIV access planning.

Medicaid is the cornerstone of health insurance coverage for people with HIV, and crucial to ending the HIV epidemic. But on January 1, 2027, 41 states plus DC will be implementing a new Medicaid work requirement that will disrupt coverage for millions of people, including tens of thousands of people with HIV. Come learn about what the requirement is, to whom it applies, how states are implementing it, how to navigate it, and what you can do to advocate for yourself and other people with HIV to minimize the number of people who lose access to care because of it.

Participants will learn how a Black LGBTQ+ led coalition in Chicago developed a holistic and community-centered wellness model to support HIV prevention, care engagement, and long-term wellness among Black gay, bisexual, and same-gender-loving men. The session will explore how community-based organizations collaborated to create a “one-stop shop” approach that integrates mental health support, spiritual wellness, wellness drop-ins, retreats, referrals, and community-based care navigation in service of strengthening pathways into HIV prevention and treatment services. Attendees will leave with practical insight into building culturally responsive partnerships and whole-person wellness strategies that support Getting to Zero goals.

Health departments operate within complex federal requirements while continuously evolving HIV service delivery systems. This session highlights Mississippi’s journey to strengthen its Ryan White Part B program through a collaborative, multi-partner approach.

This workshop will explore how growing up with HIV, coupled with limited, fear-intensive sex education, impacted the sexual development, sexual expression, intimate relationships, and sexual autonomy of Lifetime Survivors.

The purpose of the session is to Identify key federal programs and benefits available to older adults aging with HIV/AIDS. We will discuss and understand the major health challenges associated with aging and long-term HIV survivorship. Attendees will be made aware of how to access community resources that support independent living and healthy aging.

This workshop will explore the unique impact of isolation on the developing mind of a Lifetime Survivor and examine the influence of social support networks on mental health, medication adherence, care retention, parenthood, clinical practice, and research. Because Lifetime Survivors represent a small and geographically dispersed population, many grow up without peers who share their lived experiences, contributing to isolation, stigma, and unmet psychosocial needs. By examining the impact of national support networks, this workshop positions community as a vital investment and tool for sustaining health, fostering leadership, and creating solutions within rare populations.

This interactive session spotlights the NextGen: Emerging Leaders Fellowship, NMAC’s hybrid professional development initiative for young adults ages 18-25. After completing a leadership training series focused on HIV prevention, public health, and professional development wellness, fellows receive mini grants to design and implement original campaigns in their local communities. Presenters will share examples of their youth-driven projects, including creative outreach events, social media campaigns, and peer education workshops, along with evaluation insights that demonstrate impact. This session will celebrate how NextGen fosters leadership beyond training, positioning young people as bold messengers of health, equity, and stigma-free futures.; ; Learning Objectives:; 1. Examine innovative, youth-centered approaches to community-based HIV prevention and education.; 2. Understand how leadership fellowships and mini grants can support long-term public health engagement.; 3. Learn strategies for evaluating and sustaining youth-led public health initiatives.

The Office of AIDS Research (OAR) at the National Institutes of Health (NIH) coordinates, manages, and catalyzes the NIH HIV Research Program. OAR establishes HIV and HIV-related research priorities that reflect emerging scientific opportunities and evolving needs to address the HIV epidemic. OAR collaborates with NIH partners; federal agencies; academic institutions; people with and impacted by HIV as well as co-occurring conditions; community organizations; and other partners to guide a comprehensive HIV research agenda focused on prevention, treatment, care, cure, and co-occurring conditions.

This session will inform attendees about OAR’s role within NIH, strategic priorities, scientific programs, and cross-disciplinary coordination efforts. It will strengthen participants’ knowledge on how federal HIV research planning is organized; community and scientific input inform priority-setting; and the NIH HIV research portfolio aligns with efforts to address the needs of people with and affected by HIV. Participants will gain a clearer understanding of OAR’s role within NIH and the NIH HIV research enterprise, including its history, legislative mandate, strategic framework, and current priorities. Participants will learn how their voices are heard and incorporated into NIH HIV research priorities, OAR programs, and program outcomes. Participants will also learn how they can engage with OAR and NIH.

This session will include an interactive segment for participants to share perspectives on tools and resources that could support community engagement, including a practical how-to guide to help community-based organizations navigate and enter the NIH system.

Everyone has a serostatus, but over the last 45 years, progress related to destigmatizing HIV status sharing has been led by people living with the virus. This program analyzes the legal, policy, social, and intimate landscape around HIV disclosure and questions how U=U and other prevention models have affected the conversation. Ultimately, we will walk participants through why a person might want to disclose (or not), what is lost if they do, address what is required for a person to disclose safely, and ask how to transform disclosure so that it is no longer a burden for people with HIV.

This interactive workshop examines storytelling and mentorship as leadership development strategies for LGBTQ+ communities of color within the HIV movement. Using NMAC’s Gay Men of Color (GMoC) Fellowship as a national model, presenters will demonstrate how personal narratives and lived experiences can serve as evidence for advocacy, representation, and leadership development. Through personal testimony, digital storytelling, and performance examples, participants will explore how storytelling-based mentorship can reduce stigma, strengthen community trust, and prepare emerging leaders to contribute to HIV prevention, care, advocacy, and the HIV workforce. Attendees will leave with strategies for designing leadership initiatives within their communities and organizations.

Our Stories, Our Voices is a community-based participatory storytelling initiative designed to elevate Black women’s voices and transform conversations about HIV prevention, care, and wellness in Jackson, Mississippi. The project was developed in response to community feedback highlighting the need for Black women to see themselves reflected in HIV-related messaging and to have opportunities to share their lived experiences. Through storytelling, community engagement, and leadership development, the initiative seeks to reduce stigma, increase awareness of HIV prevention options, strengthen connections between Black women and healthcare providers, and create culturally responsive pathways for dialogue, education, and community healing.

Aguilar Salud was created from lived experience, community care, and the belief that effective public health outreach

As the HIV movement approaches five decades of advocacy and community mobilization, ensuring the transfer of knowledge, leadership, and urgency across generations is essential to ending the epidemic. This interactive workshop features three Black gay men representing diverse experiences within the HIV movement, including two long-term HIV advocates living with HIV and one HIV-negative public health leader committed to advancing health equity for marginalized communities. Through moderated discussion, audience engagement, and collaborative problem-solving, participants will explore intergenerational leadership, identify strategies for sustaining community engagement, and develop practical approaches to strengthen the future of HIV prevention, care, and advocacy.

Federal law guarantees no cost-sharing for PrEP under the ACA preventive services mandate. Yet challenges persist, threatening progress for communities most impacted. This workshop addresses PrEP coverage protections under federal and state law. With the ACA preventive services framework facing unprecedented threats from federal administrative actions and lack of enforcement, advocates, clinicians, and community members need a clear understanding of existing legal protections and strategies to defend them. Through interactive discussion and practical tools, this session equips participants to understand PrEP coverage rights, assess emerging threats, and mobilize at the state and federal levels.

This would be a interactive, scenario-based workshop designed to prepare advocates for different federal political outcomes following the midterm elections.

People living with HIV have always been at the center of the HIV movement, yet many organizations continue to engage them without sharing meaningful power. This interactive workshop challenges participants to move beyond participation toward leadership, influence, and decision-making. Through practical tools, real-world examples, and facilitated discussion, participants will explore how to operationalize MIPA in ways that build community power, strengthen accountability, and support leadership development. Attendees will learn strategies for transforming engagement structures, increasing shared decision-making, and ensuring people living with HIV remain at the center of shaping the future of the HIV movement.

We need to talk. PrEP works – nearly 100% effective at preventing HIV transmission when taken as prescribed. Yet in the Coachella Valley, a single zip code determines whether you access it easily or not at all. This session argues that PrEP access is not a medical problem – it is a class problem, made visible by the starkest of contrasts: abundant access for affluent gay men in Palm Springs and near-zero access for trans women of color working survival economies twelve miles east. We are coming to this conference with the data, the receipts, and the community experience.

Brothers Who Read is a weekly book club and discussion group within Black Brothers Esteem (BBE) at the San Francisco AIDS Foundation (SFAF). Serving Black gay, bisexual, and same-gender-loving (SGL) men, the program integrates cultural affirmation, peer support, and HIV prevention and care through literature centered on Black LGBTQIA+ identity. Grounded in the biopsychosocial model, it leverages Black LGBTQIA+ literature to foster collective self-esteem, improve mental and physical health outcomes, support HIV retention in care, and connect members to SFAF’s wrap-around HIV and substance use services.

This session explores the importance of increasing and sustaining trans leadership within HIV prevention, healthcare, advocacy, and public health systems. Facilitated by Terra Campbell, the presentation will examine how visibility, authentic community engagement, and relationship-building create opportunities for trans leaders to influence systems and drive equitable change. Terra will discuss barriers trans professionals continue to face, including burnout, tokenization, and limited advancement opportunities. Session will conclude with a panel discussion and audience Q&A featuring trans-identified leaders serving in C-suite and senior executive roles across HIV, healthcare, advocacy, and adjacent sectors, highlighting leadership journeys and strategies for strengthening trans leadership pipelines.

As reproductive rights, maternal health, gender-affirming care, and HIV services face increasing challenges, Black women and BIPOC communities continue to experience disproportionate HIV and reproductive health inequities. QUEEN TALKTM (Quality Education and Empowerment Network) is a culturally responsive intervention that integrates reproductive justice, HIV prevention and treatment, and sexual wellness through the Sexual Health Model. This workshop explores how reproductive autonomy, healthy relationships, pleasure, parenting, maternal health, and healthcare access influence HIV outcomes. Participants will learn how intergenerational dialogue can strengthen HIV prevention, healthcare navigation, community leadership, and sexual health equity across the lifespan.

What is race-based medicine? How does it impact our ability to close the HIV care gap 45 years into the epidemic? This 90-minute workshop examines how race-based medicine, the persistent, scientifically unsupported practice of using socially defined race as a biological proxy, creates structural barriers that drive HIV disparities in highly impacted communities. Drawing on the groundbreaking research of Dr. Andrea Deyrup as a framework, participants will explore how flawed race-coded diagnoses, delayed care, and provider bias compound barriers to equitable HIV care. Leave equipped to identify, challenge, and dismantle race-based medical practices in clinical, advocacy, and community engagement work.

This workshop introduces a movement-centered philanthropic model designed by and for Lifetime Survivors of HIV. Dandelions, Inc. is building a survivor-led funding ecosystem that redistributes resources directly into communities through microgrants, emergency assistance, leadership development, storytelling initiatives, and seed funding for survivor-led organizations. Participants will explore how participatory grantmaking, survivor governance, and trust-based philanthropy can strengthen leadership sustainability, reduce burnout, and create pathways for future generations of HIV leaders. The session presents an innovative framework for shifting power, resources, and decision-making authority to directly impacted communities.

This program evaluates a community-based, whole-person health model for human immunodeficiency virus (HIV) care that integrates physical, mental, behavioral, and social health services without silos. The purpose is to improve rapid linkage to care, treatment initiation, and viral suppression among diverse populations affected by social determinants of health. The model incorporates trauma-informed, culturally responsive, and multidisciplinary services across outpatient, mobile, and referral pathways, including emergency department linkage. This abstract describes outcomes of integrated HIV testing, rapid antiretroviral therapy initiation, and coordinated care strategies designed to reduce disparities and improve continuity of care across the HIV care continuum.

This interactive workshop seeks to address a technical assistance (TA) priority identified at NASTAD’s National Consultation on Populations Aging with and Vulnerable to HIV in July 2024, which brought together national experts, community partners, and those with lived experience to provide peer-to-peer information on areas of focus for the aging population, including how health departments have engaged or can engage this community to better understand and support their needs. Attendees indicated that a workshop on how to develop, disseminate, synthesize, and operationalize a population-specific needs assessment would be beneficial for helping to identify gaps in prevention and care.

People living with HIV who are out of care often continue accessing social service programs, creating opportunities for re-engagement outside traditional medical settings. This workshop will present Friends For All’s “No Wrong Door” model, which integrates HIV care navigation into social service settings to identify individuals who have fallen out of care and facilitate rapid re-engagement. Participants will learn how universal screening, data integration, co-located linkage staff, and supportive services can improve care engagement. The session will highlight implementation strategies, lessons learned, outcomes achieved, and practical steps organizations can use to develop similar models within their communities.

This institute reimagines what EHE would look like through the introduction of practical approaches to braided, blended, and sequential funding. Participants will explore funding models and organizational change management frameworks that align multiple funding sources while maintaining compliance, accountability, and measurable impact. The institute will also highlight strategies for obtaining blended, braided, and sequential funding through strategic planning, cross-sector partnerships, and durable fund development models. Participants will leave with a practical framework for fiscal mapping and opportunities to redesign the fiscal operations of HIV prevention and care programs, bridging innovation and sustainability of CBOs to accelerate progress toward EHE.

You do extraordinary work. What if you didn’t have to do it alone?

This session will include a landscape of harm reduction programs across the US, and an overview of the federal, state and local threats to harm reduction programs. The discussion will focus on harm reduction models in a variety of settings, resources and programming, including viral hepatitis and HIV prevention, screening and linkage. Attendees will leave the session with action items on how to improve services for people who use drugs within their community and ideas for how to address recent policy challenges.

An original project, Reflect & Reveal uses storytelling and community leadership to explore how same-gender-loving (SGL) men of color ages 18 to 35 experience family and community sexual-health dialogue, impacting HIV prevention and care. SGL Men of color experience disparities in sexual health that stem from a lack of knowledge, medical mistrust, cultural nuances, and a lack of comprehensive discussions within sexual health topics from their youth. The project shifted from photovoice to confidential interviews to deepen disclosure and disaggregate findings across Black, Latinx, Asian, Arab, and Native Hawaiian/Pacific Islander groups.

The Gilead COMPASS Initiative® was designed to address HIV disparities in the U.S. South through a multi-sector model combining philanthropic investment, capacity building, technical assistance, and community-driven leadership. This session will examine how collaboration between corporations, academia, national non-profits, and community-based organizations (CBOs) strengthened HIV prevention, treatment, and care access. Presenters will share best practices, lessons learned, and strategies that supported organizational sustainability and expansion, leadership development, and HIV advocacy, reinforcing the healthcare safety net CBOs provide. The session is a call to action for funders and community leaders to reimagine and discuss collaborative models that close healthcare gaps.

This workshop introduces a culturally grounded HIV mentorship model designed to better support gay men of color and address limitations of traditional mentoring approaches. Participants will examine how conventional models can reinforce inequities, learn the model’s multilevel structure and core principles, and explore its application across public health, community, and research settings. Through discussion and real-world scenarios, attendees will assess implementation challenges, provide feedback on model refinement, and identify practical strategies for strengthening mentoring relationships. The workshop concludes with actionable tools and guidance for adapting and implementing equitable mentorship practices within participants’ own organizations and communities

Across the United States and around the world, communities are confronting a growing wave of policies and political movements that threaten access to healthcare, economic security, civil rights, and democratic participation. Attacks on Medicaid, Medicare, SNAP, reproductive healthcare, gender-affirming care, public education, labor rights, and essential public services are not occurring in isolation. They are part of broader efforts that concentrate power, weaken democratic institutions, scapegoat vulnerable communities, and undermine the public systems that support collective well-being.

This workshop will explore how community pharmacies can serve as trusted, convenient, and stigma-reducing access points for HIV prevention and care. Using the Rx for Change model, participants will discuss how pharmacy-based HIV testing, PrEP education, referrals, and prescriptions can increase access in communities disproportionately impacted by HIV, particularly in the U.S. South. The workshop will allow participants to examine the role of community-based organizations, pharmacy teams, public health partners, and policymakers in transforming pharmacies into sustainable HIV prevention access points.

For over 45 years, communities impacted by HIV have transformed pain into power, advocacy into action, and stories into movements. This dynamic institute explores how faith communities can harness storytelling to confront stigma, elevate lived experiences, and strengthen HIV prevention, care, and advocacy efforts. Participants will examine emerging trends in faith-based HIV engagement, including trauma-informed ministry, intergenerational leadership, and church-public health partnerships. Through powerful narratives and practical strategies, attendees will learn how congregations can honor the movement’s legacy while building more equitable, inclusive pathways to health and wellness. Together, our stories become catalysts for unbreakable change and power.

“See Us Trans: Storytelling, Visibility, and Community Power in the HIV Response” highlights how FLUX uses storytelling, visibility, and community engagement to support trans and nonbinary communities impacted by HIV. Through outreach, events, partnerships, and lived experiences, FLUX creates affirming spaces that encourage prevention, reduce stigma, and increase access to resources and support. This workshop explores how community-led leadership and authentic representation can build trust, strengthen engagement, and empower communities to shape conversations around HIV advocacy, wellness, and care.

Through storytelling, archival materials, and intergenerational dialogue, this workshop brings together a moderated conversation between people with lived experience working in the sexual education and pleasure fields, public health experts, and attorneys exploring how communities left behind by the government and public health during the early days of the epidemic kept themselves safe with formal and informal harm reductive sexual health practices as well as how people living with HIV today can have healthy, positive sex lives amidst prevailing stigma and HIV criminalization laws.

The appeal of diverse dining options on menus in cafes mirrors the variety of sex options that people may wish to enjoy, hungry for everything that physical intimacy has to offer. However, based on marketing visuals, only younger adults seem to have an appetite for sex, while older adults are associated with safety alerts but not sexual activities. Hence, sexual health campaigns should intentionally celebrate intimacy and sex among older adults. The Sex Never Gets Old campaign hears directly from older adults about their sex lives, allowing contemporary viewers to see themselves reflected in the narrative accounts.

The SHE MATTERS initiative addresses gaps in HIV prevention, testing, and care in Jackson, Mississippi, following reductions in sexual and reproductive health funding. Using HIV/STI self-collection testing kits within a low-barrier community testing center model, participants complete specimen collection in a trusted, non-clinical setting while receiving education, health navigation, and linkage services. The program also provides PrEP education and referrals and re-engages people living with HIV who have fallen out of care. By reducing stigma and improving access to services, SHE MATTERS demonstrates how community-based self-collection testing can strengthen HIV prevention and care in underserved communities.

This interactive workshop will introduce HIV clinicians, practitioners, and advocates to evidence-based tools to support the creation of sustainable, affirming partnerships across diverse faith communities. Participants will examine effective methods for dismantling HIV stigma and establishing inclusive interfaith health ministries, and fostering holistic wellness. Ultimately, attendees will walk away with actionable blueprints to initiate or deepen collaborative partnerships, with the goal of transforming multi-faith spaces into safe, supportive environments for HIV prevention, education, and care.

Healthcare professionals increasingly encounter situations involving fear, frustration, mistrust, trauma, stigma, substance use, behavioral health concerns, or emotional distress. Effective communication is a core clinical and public health skill that helps maintain safety while preserving dignity and strengthening therapeutic relationships. This highly interactive workshop emphasizes practical communication and behavioral strategies that participants can immediately apply in clinical, community, outreach, and public health settings. This session is designed for multidisciplinary teams, including clinicians, nurses, pharmacists, behavioral health providers, disease intervention specialists, community health representatives, outreach workers, supervisors, and program leaders.; ; Learning Objectives:; 1) Recognize early indicators of escalating interactions in healthcare and community settings. 2) Practice evidence-informed verbal and non-verbal techniques that promote safety and trust. 3) Apply trauma-informed and culturally responsive communication strategies to challenging real-world scenarios.

Successful HIV, hepatitis, and STI programs are built on relationships. Whether engaging Tribal leadership, collaborating with community organizations, supporting people with lived experience, or working across healthcare systems, strong partnerships are essential for sustainable public health practice. This interactive workshop focuses on practical skills for building authentic community partnerships and strengthening engagement with Indigenous communities. Through facilitated exercises, case discussions, and peer learning, participants will examine strategies for listening to communities, sharing decision-making, navigating difficult conversations, responding to community concerns, and developing partnerships that support long-term health improvement.; ; Learning Objectives:; Participants will be able to: 1) Identify communication practices that foster trust and meaningful community engagement. 2) Apply strategies for building and sustaining collaborative partnerships with Indigenous communities and organizations. 3) Develop practical approaches for strengthening community-centered HIV, hepatitis, and STI prevention, care, and health promotion efforts.

After nine years and $133 million invested across 498 Southern organizations, the Gilead COMPASS Initiative® enters its dissemination phase with an urgent message: when the political environment actively undermines community health structure, the HIV movement must pivot from addressing social determinants to confronting political determinants of health. This Institute presents findings from the 2026 “State of the South” (SOTS), a multi-state community engagement process conducted across nine sessions. Through facilitated exercises, case studies, and small-group strategy sessions, participants will leave equipped with coalition-building tools, advocacy frameworks, and concrete strategies to protect HIV infrastructure in an increasingly hostile political environment.

Learning Objectives:
By the end of this Institute, participants will be able to:

* Describe the reach and impact of nine years of the COMPAS Initiative community-centered HIV investment in the South, and analyze how political determinants of health, including criminalization, wide-spread defunding, and anti-trans legislation, now threaten those gains.
* Apply a community-tested framework for building cross-sector coalitions that integrate HIV, housing, immigration, and reproductive justice advocacy.
* Identify concrete next steps to engage their own communities in the SOTS conversation, including coalition partners, knowledge-sharing strategies, and local governance targets, grounded in the Political Determinants of Health framework.

“Step Through History” is a community-led workshop that uses line dancing, storytelling, and HIV history to create culturally grounded and intergenerational approaches to HIV education. Inspired by the lived experience of a Black transgender woman and long-term HIV survivor diagnosed during the late 1980s, the session explores how grief, stigma, trauma, and social connection shape engagement across the epidemic. Participants engage with historically significant music and movement as culturally familiar memory anchors that support emotional connection, historical retention, and community participation while modeling adaptable, low-cost strategies for HIV education, prevention, and community engagement within diverse local communities.

The development and delivery of optimal healthcare and supportive services for people living with HIV includes the participation of people living with HIV at every level and point in the process. Employment opportunities for people living with HIV in the HIV workforce not only can be transformational for them, but also can strengthen our capacity to effectively reach and serve our communities. Best practices for recruiting, hiring, and employing people living with HIV across the continuum of programs and agencies will be presented and explored with a diverse panel of trainers, peer providers and other professionals living with HIV.

Public health organizations face ongoing challenges sustaining workforce development amid evolving community needs, staff turnover, and limited training resources. This session highlights a technical assistance partnership between CAI and the Houston Health Department focused on strengthening internal training capacity through facilitation and curriculum development skill-building. Rather than relying solely on external trainers, the initiative emphasized sustainable, learner-centered workforce development tailored to organizational culture and staff expertise. Presenters will share lessons learned related to organizational engagement, adapting technical assistance to workforce needs, and building internal training infrastructure. Attendees will gain practical strategies to support sustainable workforce development within public health settings.

This workshop examines persistent HIV and STI prevention literacy gaps among college-age young adults identified through community outreach and engagement conversations in Broward County. Despite major advances in HIV prevention and treatment, many students continue to express confusion, stigma, and misinformation surrounding HIV transmission, PrEP, U=U, STI testing, and sexual health communication. Presented from the perspective of a long-term person living with HIV and community educator, the session explores how storytelling, lived experience, and trusted peer engagement can strengthen prevention education, reduce stigma, and create more effective and culturally responsive sexual health conversations with young adults.

This session is designed to help develop resilient LGBTQ and HIV/AIDS organizational systems that effectively support trans leaders operating within cisgender-led spaces. By centering trauma-informed practices, the session focuses on healing from historical exclusion, dismantling systemic barriers, and creating sustainable, inclusive advancement pathways. Participants will engage with frameworks for radical honesty and authentic allyship, transitioning from performative diversity initiatives to meaningful, long-term organizational transformation that honors the leadership, expertise, and well-being of trans staff.

In the U.S., Black women with HIV disproportionately experience suboptimal HIV care outcomes (e.g., low viral suppression, medication nonadherence). Intersecting epidemics of intimate partner violence, substance use, and adverse mental health (e.g., depression, post-traumatic stress disorder) further worsen HIV care outcomes. Novel and trauma informed and gender reflective approaches are needed to support women’s sustained engagement in HIV care. LinkPositively; an NIMH-funded and woman-led research pilot study to assess the feasibility, acceptability and determine preliminary effects of the intervention on HIV care outcomes, meets the remit through leveraging innovation mHealth, online social networking, and trauma-informed peer navigation.

The prevalence of HIV and hepatitis C virus (HCV) infection in correctional facilities is higher than in the general population. This elevated burden and frequent interruptions in care during incarceration present a critical need for early identification and linkage to treatment. The purpose of this project was to assess the burden of HIV and hepatitis C cases in the Puerto Rico Prison System with subsequent referral to care of the identified cases.

Traditional, siloed HIV education falls short in preparing clinicians for the complexities of modern care. As biomedical interventions advance, persistent gaps in prevention and treatment remain-deeply driven by co-occurring mental health conditions, substance use, and structural inequities. This 90-minute workshop addresses the urgent need to transition health professions education toward an integrated, syndemic framework. Participants will explore how to design training models that prepare both emerging and experienced professionals for equity-centered, whole-person care, ultimately ensuring that workforce capacity aligns with the evolving realities of communities most impacted by HIV

ViiV Healthcare invites you to explore an expansive vision of access to care, one that extends beyond healthcare services to include the relationships, resources, and support systems that help people and communities thrive. Through reflection and dialogue, this workshop will explore what accessible, meaningful, and sustainable HIV prevention and care can look like for our future selves and our communities.

The importance of expanding HIV testing.

Learning Objectives:
Increase awareness of limited HIV testing; implications of recent policies affecting HIV testing in Ending the Epidemic jurisdictions.

GLAAD’s 2026 State of HIV Stigma Study examines how stigma is shaped by media, misinformation, AI, storytelling gaps, and barriers to care. This interactive workshop will share key findings from the study and create space for participants to discuss how communities most impacted by HIV can use data, lived experience, and storytelling to advance education, accountability, and action. Through brief presentations, facilitated dialogue, and audience engagement, participants will explore how community voice can strengthen public understanding, challenge stigma, and guide cross-sector responses across media, public health, advocacy, and digital platforms.

This interactive workshop is designed for emerging leaders, young professionals, advocates, and community changemakers who want to strengthen their advocacy skills and deepen their impact within the HIV movement. Through hands-on activities, real world scenarios, and lessons learned from the PoWER NextGen HIV Leadership Academy (PNG), participants will explore how advocacy can be used to educate, mobilize, and create change within their communities. While the workshop is centered on developing the next generation of advocates, organizations and community leaders attending the session will also gain an adaptable framework for cultivating advocacy skills among emerging leaders in their own programs.

Steeping Self-Care is an interactive wellness experience presented by Upspoken and RoyalTea. Designed for advocates, leaders and conference attendees, this community-centered workshop promotes self-care, creativity and connection. Participants will create a custom tea blend and paint a mug or teacup while engaging in meaningful conversation and reflection. Centering the idea that caregivers must also care for themselves, the experience provides a welcoming space to recharge, build relationships and explore how creativity and collective care can strengthen advocacy, wellness and community impact.

This workshop explores how storytelling shapes our understanding of the body, illness, suffering, and healing. Drawing on the narrative framework of The Wounded Storyteller, the archetype of Chiron, and Carl Jung’s concept of individuation, participants will examine the stories they have inherited and created about vulnerability, health, and transformation. Through reflection, discussion, and storytelling exercises, the workshop aims to help participants better understand how narrative influences meaning-making, identity, resilience, and human connection, while offering tools to engage experiences of illness and healing with greater awareness and compassion.

“Catch-a-Vibe” is an observational cohort study examining health-related social needs and adherence to long-acting injectable cabotegravir (CAB-LA) among key populations: Black and/or Latine men who have sex with men, Black and/or Latine cisgender women, and transgender/nonbinary persons. These groups experience co-occurring, syndemic conditions driven by structural marginalization, including depression, suicidality, and violence victimization. However, the impact of syndemic burden on CAB-LA adherence remains understudied in real-world settings.

For more than 45 years, the House and Ballroom community has developed culturally grounded, community-led responses to HIV that continue to succeed where traditional systems often struggle. This interactive institute explores how Ballroom’s homegrown “intraventions”-peer-created strategies, support systems, and spaces of care-serve as a blueprint for effective HIV prevention, treatment engagement, and community wellness. Drawing from Ballroom-led initiatives, organizations, and community spaces, participants will examine how trust, belonging, mutual aid, and leadership development have produced sustainable health outcomes and offer critical lessons for strengthening the future of the nation’s HIV response.

As the HIV movement approaches five decades of advocacy, care, and resilience, a critical question remains:

Who will lead us into the future?

This interactive panel brings together veteran activists, emerging leaders, public health innovators, and community advocates to explore how the HIV movement must evolve to meet new challenges.

From shifting funding landscapes and political attacks on public health to digital organizing, intersectional advocacy, and youth leadership, panelists will discuss what it will take to keep the movement relevant, effective, and unbreakable for the next 45 years. As we ask the ultimate question: Are we doing enough?

Disruptive, community-led engagement strategies in close conjunction with effective healthcare/public health services are crucial to addressing health inequities and extending gay men’s quality of life. This presentation will demonstrate key components of Impulse Group’s “Engage Support Connect (ESC)” model for engaging gay men of diverse backgrounds in health awareness activities and linkages to quality care resources. The ESC model involves strategic advocacy-driven participatory social events; community activations and conversations; provocative social media and peer-to-peer guerilla marketing; and grassroots advocacy mobilization. Once rapport has been established, men directly access a network of supportive services and resources based on their specific needs.

This interactive workshop will explore the components of Trauma Informed Care (TIC) and the lessons learned from the Hawaii Health & Harm Reduction Center’s (HHHRC) journey towards becoming a Trauma-Informed Care Organization. Research shows that 90% of people living with HIV have experienced at least one traumatic event in their lifetime, and the organizations that provide support should be trauma-informed. Participants will discuss how HIV services can be aligned with the TIC principles of safety, trust and transparency, voice and choice, collaboration, peers and culture and examples of what TIC looks like at the agency level.

Focusing on the work of the Louisiana Coalition on Criminalization and Health (LCCH) over the past four years, this institute will examine the organization’s successful campaign to modernize Louisiana’s Intentional Exposure to HIV statute. We will break down how LCCH built a statewide coalition of advocates, increased community capacity, developed leadership, leveraged national partnerships, and collaborated with non-traditional partners to achieve legislative success. Additionally, we will discuss why specific education and outreach strategies were effective, highlighting the LCCH Speakers Bureau and our four distinct approaches to legislative advocacy.

The Hispanic/Latine Health Leadership Institute at the United States Conference on HIV/AIDS (USCHA) will present an opportunity to share our solidarity, network, and develop strategies to advance the goals of the Federal, States and Puerto Rico to Ending the HIV Epidemic (ETE) plans and other Federal health critical issues impacting diverse communities. We are proposing a three hours institute that will bring together providers, community advocates, researchers, and public health officials concerned about the health challenges faced by the communities we serve.

Learning Objectives:
a. Assessing the realities, strengths, and challenges of current strategies to reduce HIV infections, increase PrEP uptake, and have an undetectable viral load among Puerto Rican/Hispanic/Latine communities.

b. Identifying Federal, Statewide and Puerto Rico strategies to address structural factors hindering service delivery, CBOs stability, and the capacity of the front-line HIV and public health workforce.

c. Opportunities to provide feedback to our 2024 Federal Hispanic Health Action Agenda, and plans toward 2028 national leadership summit.

d. Recommend action steps for a coordinated Federal strategy that responds to the synergistic impact of HIV/HCV/STI, substance use, behavioral health, and other health emergencies.

Community-based organizations (CBOs) are essential to HIV prevention, care, and advocacy across the U.S. South, yet many operate in environments marked by funding instability and shifting political priorities. Emerging organizations, particularly those led by and serving communities most impacted by HIV, often lack the infrastructure needed to sustain services during periods of financial uncertainty. This study examines the “Pinocchio Effect,” a model of organizational transformation in which informal, volunteer-led initiatives evolve into sustainable, credible organizations through targeted investments in leadership, evaluation, partnerships, and resource development. The study explores how infrastructure-building strengthens long-term organizational resilience and service continuity.

People with lived experience have always shaped the HIV movement through advocacy, mentorship, storytelling, and community leadership. As the movement evolves, intentional cultivation of intergenerational leadership is essential to sustaining community engagement and movement continuity. This interactive workshop brings together leaders connected to multiple leadership development initiatives to explore how lived experience can strengthen advocacy, systems engagement, civic participation, mentorship, and community leadership across generations. Through facilitated conversation, reflection prompts, audience discussion, and participatory engagement, attendees will examine how leadership cultivation strengthens communities, develops future advocates, and helps ensure the HIV movement remains resilient, connected, and future-focused.

Stable housing is a critical but often overlooked HIV prevention strategy. This poster presents findings from a peer-reviewed longitudinal study examining the relationship between Housing Opportunities for Persons With AIDS (HOPWA) funding and new HIV diagnoses across all 50 U.S. states from 2015-2020. Using fixed-effects panel analysis, the study found that increased HOPWA funding was associated with significant reductions in new HIV diagnoses. The poster highlights the role of housing as a structural HIV intervention and discusses implications for advocates, policymakers, researchers, and service providers working to end the HIV epidemic.

Substance use has always been a major obstructor to HIV prevention and treatment adherence for BIPOC PLWHA. HRC employs a whole person approach, using storytelling to introduce harm reduction tools including NARCAN, Fentanyl test strips, clean syringes and info on mental health and LAIs in our “goodie bags.” We will provide free goodie bags and education on each item at USCHA , do a modified training and conduct storytelling activities in both Spanish and English in one workshop. We will give strategies to bring CBOs to PLWHA and Spanish speakers, ensuring there are linkage opportunities in communities across the country.

This interactive workshop explores how storytelling and music creation can support emotional wellness and engagement in HIV care. Grounded in lived experience, the session introduces participants to a guided process of reflecting on personal narratives and transforming them into music using accessible AI tools. The purpose is to create a space where individuals can process their experiences, reduce internalized stigma, and reconnect with a sense of agency. By centering storytelling as a pathway to healing, this workshop demonstrates how creative expression can strengthen connection to self, community, and long-term care engagement.

An exploration of healthy aging, cognitive health, frailty prevention, and strategies that support independence and well-being throughout life for people living with HIV.

Learning Objectives:
Describe the key factors that promote healthy aging, resilience, and quality of life for older adults living with HIV. Identify practical strategies to support cognitive health, reduce frailty, and maintain independence as people age with HIV. Recognize the importance of whole-person, community-centered approaches that address the physical, mental, and social needs of long-term survivors. Apply evidence-informed and peer-centered practices to improve health outcomes and enhance aging services for people living with HIV.

Tracing Transformation introduces viewers to the COMPASS ecosystem—a growing network of organizations, leaders, and communities working together to address HIV across the Southern United States. Through the voices of five leaders and partners across the COMPASS Initiative®, viewers are invited into that ecosystem, gaining a window into both the challenges communities face and the collaborative work unfolding across the region. As their perspectives intersect, the film reveals how partnerships supported through the Gilead COMPASS Initiative® are helping strengthen connections, build momentum, and open new pathways toward a more transformative approach to addressing HIV in the South.

The Washington, DC Eligible Metropolitan Area (EMA) Ryan White HIV/AIDS Program is a regionally coordinated, status-neutral, and whole-person HIV system that integrates prevention, treatment, and supportive services across multiple jurisdictions. Through aligned Ryan White Part A and Part B programming, the DC EMA operationalizes cross-sector partnerships to reduce fragmentation and address the intersecting impacts of HIV, behavioral health conditions, stigma, housing instability, and other social determinants of health. Spanning Washington, DC, Maryland, Virginia, and West Virginia, the model advances trauma-informed, culturally responsive, and equity-driven strategies designed to improve continuity of care and long-term health outcomes across the lifespan.

Black women continue to experience disproportionate HIV-related health inequities, yet many remain absent from routine conversations about pre-exposure prophylaxis (PrEP). As two Black women public health professionals working in HIV prevention, we repeatedly encountered women who were unaware that PrEP was an HIV prevention option for them. Rather than assuming what Black women needed, we listened. The result was the Mahogany Blue Black Women & PrEP Campaign and the subsequent development of the PrEP for Black Women Toolkit, resources designed to ensure that Black women are seen, heard, represented, and included in HIV prevention conversations.

Emory University’s COMPASS Coordinating Center (ECCC) uses geospatial mapping to visualize access to HIV care and services across the Southern United States. This workshop introduces participants to geospatial mapping as a tool for identifying disparities in access to quality HIV/AIDS services and examining transportation as a key social driver of health for people living with HIV (PLHIV ). Participants will analyze and discuss drive-time and public transit time maps of HIV service access in the U.S. South in 2020 and 2025 and explore how transportation mode influences service access in rural and urban communities.

This interactive workshop explores how trust can influence HIV prevention, treatment, and continuous engagement. Through simulations, discussion, and action planning, participants will explore how trust is built, challenged, and strengthened across the care continuum while identifying strategies they can implement within their organizations.

This interactive institute explores how storytelling, media representation, personal disclosure, and community leadership shape HIV advocacy in the digital age. Through lived experience, case management perspectives, reality television examples, social media narratives, and facilitated discussion, participants will examine how visibility can reduce stigma, increase engagement in care, and strengthen community connection. Co-presenters Maliek Powell and Jarreth Reid bring perspectives from media production, community advocacy, housing services, and HIV leadership. Attendees will leave with practical tools for using storytelling as a strategy for education, empowerment, advocacy, and movement building within their communities.

This interactive institute addresses the drastically shifted public health landscape of 2026. It provides a blueprint for advocacy organizations to combat staff burnout and systemic attrition. Attendees will learn strategies to protect and advance the interests of marginalized populations heavily impacted by state responses to recent executive orders, Supreme Court decisions and federal legislation like HR 1. We will share best practices to support rural populations and those that bear a disproportionate share of the chronic disease burden. Through collaborative, cross-movement frameworks, this session transforms organizational vulnerability into systemic resilience.

Housing is one of the strongest predictors of HIV health outcomes, yet it remains one of the greatest unmet needs for people living with HIV. This Institute will explore the relationship between housing and health and provide an overview of HOPWA and other federal housing resources. Participants will also receive updates on federal funding, policy developments, and legislative proposals affecting HIV housing, along with strategies for engaging in advocacy at the local, state, and national levels. The session is designed for PWH, providers, advocates, and housing professionals seeking both foundational knowledge and current information to initiate and strengthen housing programs.; ; Learning Objectives:; Participants in this Institute will be able to: 1. Discuss the need for HIV housing and the fundamentals of a successful HIV housing program. 2. Identify core components of the HOPWA program and other federal housing initiatives that may assist PWH. 3. Understand current funding levels and policies impacting HIV housing. 4. Develop strategies for advocacy efforts at the local, state, and federal level.

This workshop examines how public health evidence, lived experience, and community-led advocacy can advance HIV justice and bodily autonomy. Through a Black queer feminist and reproductive justice lens, participants will explore the impacts of HIV criminalization, sex work criminalization, and stigma on health outcomes and community wellbeing. Centering the leadership and expertise of Black women, queer, trans, and gender-expansive people living with HIV, the session highlights how evidence can be translated into policies and practices that affirm dignity, pleasure, self-determination, and health equity while challenging systems rooted in punishment, surveillance, and shame.

The Retention and Adherence Program serves patients with HIV who are newly diagnosed, out-of-care or not regularly engaged in care. Understanding how social barriers impede an individual’s ability to achieve and maintain viral load suppression is critical for achieving HIV elimination goals in New York state. To identify social determinants, an assessment was developed by the New York State Department of Health, AIDS Institute. Various key social determinants of health have been identified within the HIV patient population served through the Retention and Adherence Program. Data were analyzed to examine social determinants needs and viral load suppression.

People living with HIV are strongest when united, informed, and empowered. This workshop examines how HIV criminalization differs across the United States and the African Diaspora, through intersectional and lived-experience lens. The U.S., HIV criminalization laws largely center on non-disclosure of HIV status rather than transmission itself. However, in many African Diaspora communities, HIV criminalization may involve both disclosure and transmission. Disclosure can threaten personal safety, immigration status, housing, employment, or life itself. Participants will explore untold stories from African immigrants and LTS. Critically examine gaps in current legal frameworks, and engage in dialogue expanding HIV justice conversations and advocacy.

HIV funding decisions affect prevention, care, treatment access, and long-term public health outcomes. This interactive workshop will introduce the HIV Impact Calculator, a new HIV modeling tool and explore how advocates, health departments, community-based organizations, providers, researchers, and policymakers can use modeled data to support advocacy, program planning, education, and policy initiatives. Participants will test real-world use cases, interpret key outputs, and discuss how modeling tools can be improved to better meet stakeholder needs. The session will also gather feedback to inform future HIV data tools that help the workforce communicate the impact of prevention and care investments.

Despite advances in HIV science and U=U, stigma and outdated perceptions continue to shape the experiences of people living with HIV. #CelebrateUU is a grassroots storytelling and portrait initiative that uses creative expression, lived experience, and voluntary disclosure to humanize HIV and reduce stigma. Drawing from lessons in recovery, survivorship, and peer-support movements, the project explores how storytelling can foster connection, visibility, and community engagement while respecting autonomy and choice. Participants will learn practical, trauma-informed strategies for integrating peer-centered storytelling into HIV prevention, care, outreach, and retention efforts while addressing ethical considerations surrounding disclosure.

Serving marginalized communities is meaningful. It is also heavy, and the weight is not always visible from the outside. Vicarious trauma, chronic stress, and burnout are not just individual challenges. They’re organizational symptoms that signal deeper challenges. This interactive 90-minute workshop invites nonprofit leaders, staff, and capacity builders to explore organizational health through a trauma-informed lens. Participants will distinguish between organizational trauma symptoms and responses, examine the prevalence and cost of burnout, and leave with evidence-based strategies. Through live polls, a collaborative group activity, and a high-energy closing game, attendees will walk away with practical tools to build healthy cultures.

Latino/a/x communities bear a disproportionate HIV burden, now compounded by 2025-2026 federal funding cuts, immigration enforcement, coverage losses, and restrictions on the language used to describe them. This interactive workshop introduces VocesLatinasGuide.org a field guide developed from interviews with 20 leaders, including frontline clinicians, researchers, advocates, and organizational staff. Through facilitated case discussions and live polling, participants will apply and stress-test the guide’s twenty response strategies, spanning patient retention, organizational sustainability, coalition building, and advocacy, while adapting them to their own settings. Attendees will leave with practical tools and help shape the guide’s next edition through structured feedback.

This interactive workshop explores how power imbalances within healthcare systems, HIV programming, and community engagement continue to drive distrust, stigma, and inequitable outcomes despite advances in HIV prevention and care. Presenters representing healthcare leadership, HIV advocacy, behavioral health, policy, and lived experience will examine how communities most impacted by HIV are often excluded from meaningful decision-making processes. Through facilitated discussion and audience engagement, participants will explore strategies for shifting from performative inclusion to authentic partnership by centering lived experience, shared leadership, culturally responsive communication, and trust-centered approaches that strengthen community engagement, improve healthcare access, and support equitable HIV outcomes.

Black women continue to face persistent inequities in HIV prevention, including lower rates of PrEP awareness, access, and uptake despite being disproportionately impacted by HIV. This workshop explores how integrating sexology and infectious disease expertise can transform sexual health conversations by centering pleasure, wellness, agency, and trust. Participants will examine the impact of stigma, medical mistrust, and provider bias on prevention engagement and learn practical, culturally responsive, and trauma-informed communication strategies. The session aims to equip attendees with tools to foster more affirming, person-centered discussions that support sexual well-being and strengthen HIV prevention outcomes among Black women.

This study examines how perceived HIV/STI susceptibility aligns with sexual health, behavioral, and relationship-level vulnerability among cisgender women in Maryland, which is home to three ending the HIV epidemic jurisdictions. Using survey data from 158 women, we identify gaps between low or uncertain perceived risk and reported indicators such as condomless sex, substance-associated sex, multiple partners, partner violence, prior STI diagnosis, and limited PrEP/PEP uptake. Findings highlight the need for whole-person, trauma-informed, gender-responsive HIV/STI prevention strategies that move beyond individual risk perception and better integrate prevention into clinical and community-based sexual health settings as a standard.

Across the U.S., immigration enforcement climates have shifted since early 2025. Whether driven by legislation, proposed policy, or narrative alone, these shifts have functioned as structural determinants of health. Before any policy can take effect, communities disengage, testing drops, calls go unanswered, and medication pickups decline. This session examines how narrative environments shape trust, care-seeking behaviors, and health outcomes along the HIV care continuum. Drawing on multi-state legislative analysis, national survey data, and direct provider experience, participants will explore the problem, understand the landscape driving it, and leave with actionable strategies to stabilize trust in their own care environments.

To help end the HIV epidemic nationally, it is imperative to understand how HIV treatment and prevention services are implemented by organizations across the US. Yet, there remains a gap in our knowledge about the diverse ways in which organizations provide pre-exposure prophylaxis (PrEP). To address this, the ACCELERATE Program at Northwestern University, in partnership with NMAC, surveyed organizations within the NMAC community regarding their current and planned PrEP services.

For more than four decades, women, particularly Black women, have been the backbone of the HIV response. We educate communities, connect people to care, mentor emerging leaders, advocate for policy change, reduce stigma, and create spaces where others can share their stories and heal. Yet the women who sustain these efforts are often overlooked when we need support. This session explores the leadership, advocacy, and organizing power of Black women and other women impacted by HIV while examining the emotional, physical, and social costs of carrying communities forward. Participants will explore strategies that promote collective care, sustainability, and healing-centered leadership.

This interactive institute explores how integrated healthcare can address the overlapping needs of individuals seeking HIV prevention and treatment, sexual health services, behavioral healthcare, substance use treatment, housing support, and other essential services. Using Tarzana Treatment Centers’ 50-year evolution and “No Wrong Door” model as a practical case study, participants will examine strategies such as multidisciplinary care planning, shared electronic health records, and coordinated referral pathways. Through hands-on mapping exercises and clinical scenarios, attendees will develop a customized Integration Map or 90-day implementation plan to reduce service fragmentation and strengthen whole-person care in their own organizations and communities.

The importance of providing non-stigmatizing whole-person healthcare for persons at risk for/living with HIV, including integrated substance use disorder identification and treatment, HIV testing, PrEP/ART provision, primary care, and social support services delivered where people want services. A unique mobile healthcare model will be described, including the first legalized mobile retail pharmacy and clinic integrated with community health worker services in Connecticut.

Learning Objectives:
After attending this presentation, learners will be able to: 1. Understand the gaps in implementing the current Ending the HIV Epidemic Plan, especially for persons who use drugs (PWUD). 2. Recognize the importance of providing whole-person care – including medications for HIV, PrEP, SUDs, and routine primary care – in an integrated, non-stigmatizing manner. 3. Know the steps needed to legalize and create mobile retail pharmacy clinics and develop a mobile hub-and-spoke healthcare model with pharmacists, clinicians, and community health workers.

The purpose of this workshop is to strengthen participants’ capacity to effectively engage Latine immigrant communities through a public health lens. Presenters will share lessons learned from working with Latine immigrants who are disproportionately impacted by social and structural determinants of health, including housing instability, substance use, and stigma related to gender identity and sexual orientation.