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Live Webinar

Hidden in Pain Site: Rural HIV, Cultural Competency, and the Cost of Policy Neglect

MarkAlain Déry, DO, MPH, FACOI
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Information

Date & Time

Description

This World AIDS Day session, Hidden in Pain Site: Rural HIV, Cultural Competency, and the Cost of Policy Neglect, uses epidemiologic, historical, and policy data to show how U.S. decision-making has engineered HIV and STI inequities in rural Louisiana and the broader South. Rather than centering “individual risk,” the lecture traces how funding choices, criminalization, and other structural decisions predictably produce higher transmission, later diagnosis, and poorer outcomes. Participants from medicine, nursing, psychology, social work, counseling, and substance use treatment will examine these data through a structural lens and consider what they reveal about the current rural HIV/STI landscape. The session closes by outlining concrete directions for clinical practice and policy advocacy that are rooted in equity and justice for rural communities living with and affected by HIV and STIs.

Learning Objectives

Participants will be able to:

  • Analyze how federal and state policy decisions, structural racism, and institutional practices create healthcare disparities and HIV/STI stigma in rural Southern communities and reframe at least two common rural case scenarios in structural and policy terms rather than patient blame.

  • Identify at least one practice they can change within their own clinic or program to reduce stigma.

  • Screen rural clients for structural barriers to care to inform individual treatment planning.

  • Apply trauma-informed, culturally competent communication strategies to facilitate discussions about sexual history and harm reduction with rural HIV/STI clients.

  • Develop referral and care-coordination pathways to connect rural clients with HIV to local or telehealth medical, mental health, and social support resources.

Educational Goal

The educational goal of this workshop is to expose how U.S. policy choices, structural racism, and engineered poverty fuel HIV and STI inequities in rural Southern communities, so that participants are better equipped to build clinical practices and policies rooted in equity and justice rather than discrimination and neglect.

Target Audience

  • Addiction Professional
  • Counselor
  • Marriage & Family Therapist
  • Nurse
  • Physician
  • Psychologist
  • Social Worker

Presenters

MarkAlain Déry, DO, MPH, FACOI
Dr. MarkAlain Déry, DO, MPH, FACOI, is an infectious disease physician and epidemiologist who serves as Chief Innovation Officer and Medical Director of Infectious Diseases at Access Health Louisiana, the state’s largest Medicaid-providing clinic system. He specializes in the diagnosis and treatment of HIV/AIDS and directs HRSA Ryan White–funded programs that provide low- and no-cost HIV care for underserved communities. A long-standing health equity and human rights advocate, he founded New Orleans community radio station 102.3 FM WHIV-LP and the NoiseFilter podcast to expand access to accurate, justice-focused public health information. His work in HIV care, global outbreak response, and public communication reflects a career dedicated to reducing disparities at the intersection of medicine, media, and social justice.

Financially Sponsored By

  • Aetna Better Health of Louisiana