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Language barriers negatively affect access to social services, particularly for D/deaf populations who use Sign Language. "D/deaf" is used to encompass both the cultural conception of capital-D Deafness and the medical conception of lowercase-d deafness. Language translation/interpretation is a common need among practitioners of social, legal, medical, and public health services, all ethically bound to offer culturally sensitive services to D/deaf populations. Practitioners who speak languages other than English are often called to act as translators/interpreters, even when they are not trained to do so. Those who are monolingual often partner with trained interpreters. However, seldom are practitioners trained in issues concerning language translation/interpretation practice. This teaching note provides didactic material to help educate social workers to overcome communication barriers and better help D/deaf populations access services. We highlight unique issues concerning Sign Language interpretation and present case illustrations. We propose curricular content that may be offered as a supplement to myriad social work practice classes. Recommendations for practice and research are also included.

Research on incarcerated men indicates low PrEP access even though HIV disproportionately affects them. Intersecting attributes – urban, incarcerated, Black, heterosexual men with substance use diagnoses (SUDs) – improves the odds of HIV transmission/acquisition. It is crucial to determine, among “key populations,” who might be eligible to take PrEP. PrEP eligibility criteria have been used inconsistently in research. This exploratory, quantitative, study uses criteria from the United States Centers for Disease Control and Prevention to determine eligibility: HIV–negative test and sexually active plus a sexual partner living with HIV and/or diagnosed with an STI and/or inconsistent or no condom use for intercourse. We found a considerable percentage (n = 61; 32.8%) of PrEP–eligible individuals (n = 186) in a sample of urban, formerly incarcerated, Black, heterosexual men with SUDs. Most PrEP–eligible participants (78.7%) did not receive PrEP information from health service providers. Most participants (85.2%) reported they were “not likely” to contract HIV. This study demonstrates the accurate determination of PrEP eligibility and the need to assess individuals' awareness of their vulnerabilities to HIV acquisition – the first step needed before accessing PrEP. Interventions to improve PrEP access must focus on the accurate determination of PrEP eligibility, individuals' awareness of their vulnerability to HIV acquisition and how/when they receive information about PrEP. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This teaching note describes a workshop to help monolingual and multilingual social workers prepare for language interpretation in social work practice. Language barriers negatively affect access to social services across populations in the United States, particularly for immigrant groups with limited English proficiency. Effective language interpretation is a key component of social workers' ethical obligations of informed consent and client comprehension. Although multilingual and multicultural social workers regularly communicate across languages and cultures, language interpretation responsibilities fall disproportionately on multilingual social workers. To address these challenges, this teaching note presents two case illustrations to show how interpretation implicates ethical practice and social justice and to help develop awareness of critical issues related to language interpretation in social work practice.

Well-being is defined as the multi-dimensional experience of positive emotions, as well as life satisfaction, autonomy, and purpose. This scoping review examines the impact of musical practices on the well-being of incarcerated individuals and uniquely contributes to the literature by focusing on the relationship between music and power in carceral settings and by expounding on the ways in which musical practices both facilitate and inhibit experiences of well-being. Our review contributes to this body of literature by proposing three distinct ways musical practices may affect well-being: (1) Musical Practices and Psychological Outcomes, (2) Musical Practices and Identity Formation and (3) Musical Practices and Power. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Background: Rates of alcohol and/or substance use (ASU) among residents of predominantly Black and marginalized communities are similar to ASU rates in White communities. Yet ASU has worse consequences in predominantly Black and marginalized communities (e.g., higher incarceration). Objective: We randomized participants to one of 16 intervention conditions using a 24 full factorial design to optimize a multilevel intervention reducing ASU among 602 formerly incarcerated men with substance-use-disorders (SUD). Candidate intervention components included (1) critical dialogue (CD; six weekly 2-hour-long group sessions vs. no CD sessions), (2) Quality of Life Wheel (QLW; six weekly 1-hour-long group sessions vs. no QLW sessions), (3) capacity building projects (CBP; six weekly 1-hour-long group sessions vs. no CBP sessions), and (4) delivery by a trained peer versus licensed facilitators. Outcome was percentage of days in which participants used alcohol, cocaine, opioid, and/or cannabis in previous 30 days. Results: Intent-to-treat analysis did not meet a priori component selection criteria due to low intervention attendance. After controlling for intervention group attendance (percentage of sessions attended), peer-delivered CD and CBP produced statistically and clinically significant main and interaction effects in ASU over 5 months. Per the multiphase optimization strategy framework, we selected peer-delivered CD and CBP for inclusion as the optimized version of the intervention with a cost of US$1,380 per 10 individuals. No adverse intervention effects occurred. Conclusion: CD and CBP were identified as the only potentially effective intervention components. Future research will examine strategies to improve attendance and test the optimized intervention against standard of care in a randomized-controlled-trial. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) Diffusion of Effective Behavioral Interventions project has disseminated HIV behavioral interventions (EBIs) across the United States since the 1990s. In 2011, the CDC launched the High-Impact HIV Prevention (HIP) project, providing EBIs plus high-impact services (HIV testing, primary care, and support services). Providers (nurses, social workers, educators) are unable to consistently make linkages; thus, numerous at-risk individuals are not benefitting from HIP. Research on providers' roles in the HIV Continuum of Care--linking clients to HIV testing, primary care, and support services--is lacking. This article helps fill this gap with evidence that providers exposed to EBIs, whose agencies offer EBIs, more frequently link clients to high-impact services. This is based on diffusion of innovations theory, where individuals in social networks influence one another's adoption of innovations. We hypothesize that providers are exposed to EBIs via training, reading and hearing about EBIs, and/or discussing EBIs with colleagues. We used cross-sectional data from 379 providers from 36 agencies in New York City. We used multilevel ordinal logistic regression models to test associations between provider exposure to EBIs (agency provides EBIs) and frequency of linkages to high-impact services. Providers exposed to greater numbers of EBIs more frequently link clients to HIV, hepatitis C (HEP-C), and sexually transmitted infections testing; to primary care; and to drug treatment and mental health services. Providers link clients most frequently to primary care and HIV testing and least frequently to HEP-C testing and syringe exchange. Findings suggest a dose effect, with exposure to more EBIs resulting in more linkages. Findings show a staged, evidence-based prevention approach that includes exposure to EBIs, leading to providers linking clients to high-impact services. There needs to be emphasis on inspiring providers to engage with high-impact services at the elevated levels needed to end the epidemic.

Health and social service practitioners have not readily incorporated research-based behavioral interventions in HIV prevention practice due to lack of awareness, lack of training, and challenges translating research findings into practice. Practitioners' involvement in research is associated with their willingness to use research to guide practice. Likewise practitioners' personal and organizational characteristics have been shown to be associated with use of research findings in practice. Factors associated with practitioners' use of evidence-based interventions (EBIs) in HIV prevention, however are not well understood. While research involvement has been recommended to help practitioners overcome barriers to the use of EBIs, the types of research involvement that result in practitioners' actual use of EBIs is not known. This is partly because most studies are either qualitative or quantitative and ignore the voices of practitioners, which can be best unearthed with qualitative research followed by survey research including larger numbers of participants. By using a mixed methods approach, this study fills this gap by showing associations between practitioners' and organizational characteristics, specific areas of research involvement, and practitioners' use of EBIs. The use of mixed methods was extremely helpful to integrate in-depth qualitative interview data from practitioners across 10 community-based agencies providing social and health services, with cross-sectional survey data from practitioners across 24 agencies in New York City. We used a sequential approach for data collection and a concurrent approach for data analysis, content analysis of in-depth interviews, and multivariate linear regression analysis. Practitioners who performed research tasks/procedures similar to their professional duties as well as their level of education, knowledge about EBIs, and their agency capacity were all positively associated with HIV evidence--based interventions. Training practitioners in research, engaging practitioners in research tasks that resemble their professional practices, and capacity building within organizations to foster academic-research partnerships could optimize practitioners' use of EBIs.

Partnerships between HIV researchers and service providers are essential for reducing the gap between research and practice. Community-Based Participatory Research principles guided this cross-sectional study, combining 40 in-depth interviews with surveys of 141 providers in 24 social service agencies in New York City. We generated the Provider-Researcher Partnership Model to account for provider- and agency-level factors' influence on intentions to form partnerships with researchers. Providers preferred "balanced partnerships" in which researchers and providers allocated research tasks and procedures to reflect diverse knowledge/skill sets. An organizational culture that values research can help enhance providers' intentions to partner. Providers' intentions and priorities found in this study may encourage researchers to engage in and policy makers to fund collaborative research.