Jefferson Medical College Awarded $1.23 Million Grant to Study HIV Clinical Outcomes

The Center for Research in Medical Education and Health Care of Jefferson Medical College has been awarded a $1.23 million grant continuation from the National Institute on Drug Abuse. The grant continuation will study the clinical outcomes of children born to HIV-infected women. The study is being conducted in collaboration with researchers in the New York State Department of Social Services and New York University (NYU)/Bellevue Medical Center.

The center's senior research associate and health services division chief, Barbara J. Turner, MD, MSEd, will study prenatal care and birth outcomes for 1,700 New York State (NYS), Medicaid-enrolled, HIV-infected women who will deliver through August 1996. Dr. Turner also will examine predictors of maternal-child HIV transmission for these women's infants. Medicaid claims-based research files and vital statistics records will be used for this analysis.

Research goals

The research will aim at achieving four basic goals:

1) To evaluate the impact of Medicaid initiatives to improve prenatal and HIV-related care among HIV-infected, drug-using women;
2) To assess the impact of these Medicaid initiatives in increasing the use of zidovudine (AZT) therapy during pregnancy;
3) To examine the effect of AZT on the risk of HIV infection among offspring of these HIV-infected women; and
4) To identify major birth defects among offspring of these women and to evaluate differences in the rates of defects by maternal illicit drug use and by use of AZT.

Similar analyses will be conducted in 240 HIV-infected women and their children who are followed prospectively at New York University/ Bellevue Medical Center. The main goal will be to examine the effect of AZT on the risk of HIV infection among offspring of infected drug-using and non-drug-using women in the NYS Medicaid cohort and the NYU cohort.

"This study unites the power of population-based research using Medicaid data with specific analyses on a prospectively-followed model," comments Dr. Turner. "This will extend the understanding of the use of AZT by pregnant women with a history of illicit drug use and the impact of AZT on maternal-fetal transmission in actual clinical practice."

Founded in 1969, the Center for Research in Medical Education and Health Care strives to advance research that provides a greater understanding of factors affecting the quality and cost of heath care.