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Clinical Seminar Series

Background

The I-TECH HIV/AIDS Clinical Seminar Series is a bimonthly distance learning series aimed at health

Clinical Seminar Series website
Archives of I-TECH's HIV/AIDS Clinical Seminar Series are available online.

care workers treating HIV and AIDS in Africa, the Caribbean, and India. HIV and AIDS experts present on a variety of advanced care, comprehensive management, and treatment topics via live sessions across several countries around the globe. These live, 60-minute sessions use a case-based, presentation format in which participants are encouraged to provide input, ask questions, and share experiences via a chat function. A listserv allows participants to engage in follow-up communication across sites after each session. Archived sessions are available for downloading from the series' primary website.

Goals

  • Strengthen HIV and AIDS care and treatment services provided by health care workers in resource-limited settings.
  • Establish an international network of clinicians and health care workers that deal with HIV and AIDS who can work together to address challenging issues.
  • Promote collaboration and mutual understanding among a diverse network of clinicians.
  • Deliver up-to-date and evidence-based information on HIV and AIDS prevention, care, and management.

Objectives

  • Increase health care workers' knowledge and skills related to care, treatment, diagnosis, and comprehensive management of HIV and AIDS patients in resource-limited settings.
  • Increase collaboration and communication across the I-TECH global team of clinicians, with an emphasis on sharing best practices and lessons learned from HIV and AIDS-related clinical issues.
  • Share information on cutting edge HIV and AIDS research and evidence-based case-management approaches.
  • Identify complex issues related to managing HIV through case-specific clinical consultations.
  • Gain skill and experience in the use of the interactive webcasting distance learning technology in order to broaden its application for new audiences and purposes.

Target Audience

The intended audience for the Clinical Seminar Series includes clinicians—doctors, clinical officers, and advanced nurses—who are treating HIV and AIDS in resource-limited settings, particularly countries in which I-TECH and other University of Washington-affiliated programs are taking place.

Session Format

Live Session

Each of the "synchronous" (live) sessions is webcast using the Adobe Connect Pro Live software, and typically emphasizes a case-based instructional format. The speaker presents clinical cases using PowerPoint slides to guide the lecture and discussion of the topic. Presenters take questions from participants via the chat function of Adobe Connect.  The screen from a recent session is shown below, with the chat window showing various sites indicating how many students are present, and then entering their answers ("gp41") to a question posed by the presenter.

Adobe Connect image
Screen capture from a seminar session on Adobe Connect software.

Follow-up, Post Session

The I-TECH HIV/AIDS Clinical Seminar Series website provides the course schedule, additional resource materials for each session, an archive of each session (called a "streaming link") after it is presented, and a listserv where participants may post additional questions or engage in further "asynchronous" (non-live) text discussion with the presenter after each session.

Session Day and Time

Clinical Seminar Series sessions are held the second and fourth Thursdays of every month, starting at 7:00 a.m. Pacific Standard Time (PST) April through November, and 6:00 a.m. (PST) November through March, due to daylight saving time in the United States. (Note that unless daylight saving time is observed in that country, this time change does not affect the session's starting time in most countries).

Further Information and Contact

For more information on the Clinical Seminar Series, please visit the website at http://www.globalhivlearning.org/.

If you are interested in attending any of these sessions or finding out more about this pilot series, please contact DLinfo@u.washington.edu.

Project Leadership

Christopher Behrens, MD, MPH
Medical Director, I-TECH
behrens@u.washington.edu

Stacey H. Lissit, MPH, MS
Director of Training, I-TECH
slissit@u.washington.edu

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