COMMUNITY RESEARCH AND IMPLEMENTATION CORE Abstract The Community Research and Implementation Core (CRI) provides services that stimulate, promote and advance the conduct of innovative Community-Engaged Research (CEnR) by CIRA scientists and community research partners. The CRI Core achieves its mission through outreach, relationship and capacity building, and by providing guidance on CEnR and Implementation Science (IS) methods, particularly as they relate to small urban areas with a high prevalence of HIV. In the next five years, the Core will focus on expanding CIRA's successful New England HIV Implementation Science Network, established in 2014 with the Providence/Boston Center for AIDS Research and other key partners, and increase the production of funded research projects and publications generated by Network members. As the primary coordinator of the Network, the CRI Core will facilitate new and continued relationships between academic researchers and community practitioners throughout New England, identify collaborators for IS research projects and support IS capacity building across CIRA and the Network through seminars, workshops and training programs tailored to the needs and interests of researchers and HIV service providers/community partners. The Core will maintain and augment an online Resource Center for the Network and promote/support broad dissemination of IS and Network research. A goal of the CRI Core is to assess the applicability or adapt, as necessary, the lessons learned in HIV prevention and treatment in larger cities by addressing those aspects of implementation that require modification due to the characteristics of smaller urban settings. This innovative initiative serves as a unique contribution to the portfolio of NIMH-funded HIV prevention research centers supporting the translation of the findings from the larger metropolitan areas to smaller urban areas. To assure coverage of research issues across the prevention and care continuum, CRI Core will collaborate closely with the Clinical and Health Services Research (CHSR) Core in planning and executing activities including joint meetings. Dr. John Pachankis will serve as CRI Core Director. Dr. Pachankis is a clinical psychologist, Associate Professor of Social and Behavioral Sciences at Yale School of Public Health (YSPH), and PI or Co-I of NIH-funded trials focused on the sexual health, mental health, and substance use needs of young gay/bisexual men and transgender women, and a member of the Network. Other contributing scientists include Dr. Margaret Weeks, a socio-cultural anthropologist and Executive Director of the Institute for Community Research (ICR) in Hartford, an independent, non-profit community organization that is a collaborating institution with CIRA. Dr. Weeks has expertise in CEnR, substance use, HIV, and women's health. Dr. David Vlahov, Yale School of Nursing, has extensive expertise in substance use and HIV, and urban health research in areas of concentrated disadvantage. Other CIRA-affiliated scientists and community research partners will also regularly contribute to the Core and engage in CRI Core's activities.
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