The AETC Community/Clinical Exchange and Sustained Support (ACCESS) program, is a coordinated regional effort to provide individualized longitudinal training for minority/minority serving providers. The goal of the program is to increase HIV Service providers' access to customized training and hands-on expertise, thereby increasing patient access to quality HIV Care. The ACCESS program is an individually tailored 20 hour+ training program for HIV service providers. It is a unique integration of didactic and experiential training. Participants will be provided with preferential access to the diverse conferences, workshops, preceptorships and consultation services offered by the AETC.

Training is available for Physicians, Physician Assistants, Nurse Practitioners, Nurses, Pharmacists, Dentists, Dental Hygienists, Case Managers, Outreach Workers and other members of the healthcare team.

ACCESS is also open to community and correctional health care providers in New York and New Jersey. Applicants may have basic or advanced HIV experience, as individualized programs are designed to meet providers’ knowledge and comfort levels related to HIV service provision.

Each of the 10 AETC training sites can provide a customized ACCESS experience. Please call the training center in your local area for more information about ACCESS trainings available at their center.

Interested participants can also enroll online. Simply complete our ACCESS enrollment survey. It takes about 5 to 10 minutes to complete and has been designed to assess the HIV/AIDS education and training needs of the trainee. The information you provided will be used to develop an individualized training curriculum. We ask all applicants to complete the survey prior to beginning trainings.

For more information, contact the regional ACCESS program manager, Nadine Nader at nn69@cumc.columbia.edu.

The ACCESS Program offers two training tracks:

1. HIV screening/testing, counseling, linkage to care and diagnosis

2. HIV clinical management

The screening/testing, counseling, linkage and diagnosis track enables providers to earlier link HIV infected patients to lifesaving medical care.

The clinical management track, major topics in HIV medicine such as antiretroviral therapies, co-morbidities, metabolic disorders will be covered as well as contemporary issues in patient management such as adherence, PrEP as prevention and behavioral health issues.

The provision of culturally and linguistically competent care will be emphasized in both tracks. Within the two-track framework, the learning experience will be tailored to the participant’s specific educational needs and the community context in which he or she is practicing.