OMB Number: 0915-XXXX
Expiration date: XX/XX/20XX
Tracy Matthews, CAPT, USPHS
Deputy Director, Division of Policy and Data
HRSA/HIV/AIDS Bureau
5600 Fishers Lane, Room 9N152
Rockville, MD 20857
Dear [recipient],
On behalf of the HIV/AIDS Bureau (HAB) in the Health Resources and Services Administration (HRSA), I am requesting your assistance in helping us assess the HIV care utilization patterns and health outcomes among our clients who do not receive outpatient ambulatory health services (OAHS) directly funded from the Ryan White HIV/AIDS Program (RWHAP).
Although providers funded by RWHAP submit client-level data to us each year, there are still gaps in our knowledge about service use and process and clinical outcomes. Clinical data, including the use of antiretroviral therapy (ART) and testing for viral load, are unavailable for our clients who receive their medical care outside the RWHAP system. As a result, we are unable to measure such important outcomes as initiation of ART, retention in care, and viral suppression for this segment of our client population.
HRSA HAB has contracted with Mathematica and its partners, Mission Analytics Group and Amenity Consulting, to help us identify clients who do not receive directly-funded OAHS under the RWHAP, but get medical care from another provider. Specifically, we have asked the Mathematica team to collect information from a sample of providers that we can use to better understand (1) HIV medical care use, (2) process and clinical outcomes, (3) barriers to care, (4) unmet needs, and (5) potential opportunities for improving care and outcomes for clients who do not receive OAHS through the RWHAP. We plan to use this information to estimate retention in care and viral suppression for all RWHAP clients and to identify opportunities for improving outcomes among those who access medical care outside the RWHAP system.
We are requesting your involvement in this study by participating in (1) telephone interviews with your staff and clients and (2) medical record abstraction of key data elements for a sample of clients from your patient records or the patient records of the providers where your clients receive medical care. We hope to learn from your experience and translate your knowledge to the broader RWHAP community.
A member of the Mathematica team will contact you soon to confirm your fit with the study goals, review the data collection requirements, and verify your interest in participating. Please do not hesitate to contact me at tmatthews@hrsa.gov, the study’s Contracting Officer’s Representative Robert Mills at rmills@hrsa.gov, and Mathematica’s project director Boyd Gilman at bgilman@mathematica-mpr.com if you have questions or comments in the meantime.
Thank you for your time, and we look forward to your participation in this important study.
Sincerely,
Tracy Matthews, CAPT, USPHS
HIV/AIDS Bureau
Health Resources and Services Administration
| File Type | application/vnd.openxmlformats-officedocument.wordprocessingml.document |
| Author | Shari Glickman |
| File Modified | 0000-00-00 |
| File Created | 2021-01-15 |