Staying on top of mental health is crucial for people living with HIV (PLWH). Studies have shown that addressing mental health not only helps PLWH manage stress, address stigma, and improve quality of life but also adhere to lifesaving treatments and stay engaged in medical care.
However, access to mental health care in low- and middle-income countries in Asia is limited.
The CHIMERA program (Capacity development for HIV and MEntal Health Research in Asia), established in 2019 by amfAR’s TREAT Asia program and Columbia University’s Department of Psychiatry, is working to change that.
CHIMERA is funded by the Fogarty International Center of the U.S. National Institutes of Health (NIH) with additional support from the National Institute on Mental Health, and collaborates with partner organizations in Cambodia, Malaysia, the Philippines, and Thailand. It is nested within IeDEA Asia-Pacific, an NIH-funded HIV research network of sites across 13 countries. The program was recently renewed for another five-year term by the NIH.
Through activities such as in-person and remote workshops and mentorship, CHIMERA strengthens the skills of clinicians and researchers in relation to HIV, mental health, and implementation science, a field of study that examines how to facilitate the uptake of evidence-based practices.
CHIMERA also helps the Fellows develop as researchers. Fellows learn how to improve their grant-writing skills. And the program helps Fellows conduct HIV and mental health pilot research studies, which inform local health programs and future research funding proposals. Other professional development activities are offered, as well.
The program’s Fellows ultimately aim to promote better health outcomes for adults and adolescents impacted by HIV and mental health issues in the context of local epidemics and related public health policies.
“CHIMERA is the Asia-Pacific’s missing link between knowing and doing—the region’s first program to explicitly train researchers and clinicians at the HIV–mental health intersection using implementation science,” said Milton L. Wainberg, MD, Professor of Clinical Psychiatry, Columbia University, who is co-principal investigator of CHIMERA along with Annette Sohn, MD, PhD, Vice President and Director of TREAT Asia, amfAR.
“It turns the well-known problem—that mental illness erodes antiretroviral therapy (ART) adherence and retention [in care] while services remain scarce—into an implementation pipeline that builds regional implementation-science capacity that can generate policy-ready evidence, and move integrated HIV–mental health care into routine practice, tackling stigma and improving outcomes for people living with HIV,” he explained.
A new class of six Fellows recently completed their orientation: Dr. Narom Prak (Cambodia): Dr. Lim Quan Hziung and Preethi Raghavan (Malaysia); Dr. Ruth Anne B. Hechanova-Cruz (Philippines); and Drs. Nadvadee Aungkawattanapong and Mayteewat Chiddaycha (Thailand).
Dr. Sohn added that “the first cycle of CHIMERA exceeded our expectations in terms of the impact it had on the career and educational advancement of our Fellows and the opportunities to study and implement models of integrated care. Our graduates are supporting IeDEA Asia-Pacific research as well as helping to mentor the new Fellows. We are deeply grateful to be able to continue the program.”
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