Project neighborhoods in action: An HIV-related intervention project targeting drug abusers in Washington, DC

Project Neighborhoods in Action was a human immunodeficiency virus (HIV) ou treach and intervention program that was conducted with injection drug user s and crack users in several inner-city neighborhoods in the District of Co lumbia. Study participants were placed randomly in either a standard interv ention or an enhanced intervention condition, with more than 800 persons be ing assigned to each group. Drug use frequency dropped from 15.2 days to 12 .4 for alcohol (P < .0001), 2.1 days to 1.6 for marijuana (P < .003), 13.0 days to 8.8 days for crack (P < .0001), 2.4 days to 1.5 days for cocaine (P < .0001), 19.7 days to 15.6 for heroin (P < .0001), and 5.2 days to 3.4 fo r speedball (P < .0001). Drug injecting decreased from an average of 90.8 t imes to 66.9 (P < .0001), with both direct sharing and indirect sharing rat es decreasing significantly as well (from 2.4 to 1.1 times for the former [ P < .002] and from 12.0 to 8.1 times for the latter [P < .0004]). The numbe r of sexual partners dropped from a mean of 1.6 to 1.1 (P < .0001). The num ber of drug-injecting sexual partners went from 0.3 to 0.2 (P < .01). Havin g sex while high decreased from 11.2 times to 7.9 (P < .0001). Trading sex for drugs and/or money declined from 1.9 times to 1.3 (P < .001). Protected sex increased from 29.5% to 63.7% (P < .0001), and the number of unprotect ed sexual acts dropped from 9.6 to 7.2 (P < .0001). Only a few differences were observed for standard versus enhanced intervention respondents, with n o particular pattern formed. We were left with the impression that the stan dard intervention and enhanced intervention used in this program were about equally effective at reducing the involvement of drug abusers in HIV-relat ed risky behaviors.