RAPID, Restart & Retention Committee

The overall goal of the RAPID (Rapid ART Program Initiative for HIV Diagnoses) program is to create a set of “hubs” around the city where persons newly diagnosed with HIV (or out of care) can rapidly access antiretroviral therapy (ART) and have a smooth transition to their medical home. In order to accomplish this goal, a RAPID steering committee established hub locations, standard operating procedure (SOP) for ART start, and SOP for transition to a primary medical home. The committee works with SF Department of Public Health surveillance (now “ARCHES”) to track the uptake and outcomes of persons participating in the program. We build on the existing LINCS programs at SFDPH to create and support hubs for rapid initiation of ART to individuals.

We start ART:

Within 48 hours –

  • If acute/early infection (recent negative Ab test, RNA+/Ab– or recent symptoms of acute retroviral syndrome) or
  • Evidence of advanced infection (opportunistic infection or a CD4 count of less than 200)

Within 5 days –

  • All other newly HIV-diagnosed persons

The program aims to provide ART for up to 5 days for these individuals until they are transitioned into their medical home.

RAPID Resources

RAPID News & Updates

March 23, 2017 GTZ Consortium Meeting

Yesterday evening, Getting to Zero SF held is 1st quarterly Consortium meeting of the year.  Dana van Gorder provided a national policy update and Dr. Hyman Scott presented some of the latest HIV epidemiology, PrEP, STI and TasP data from CROI 2017.  We also heard about some of the great work accomplished by each of…

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December 1 GTZ World AIDS Day Consortium Meeting

Over 100 people filled the conference room for this special Getting to Zero World AIDS Day Consortium meeting. We heard from Health Director Barbara Garcia and Supervisor Scott Wiener, GTZ Committee Chairs shared their committee’s accomplishments over the past year and we had an engaging panel presentation & discussion on Aging and HIV. Please see…

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