Background: Area-level socioeconomic conditions are associated with epidemic rates of viral hepatitis and HIV amongst urban injection drug users (IDUs), but whether specific socioeconomic markers are uniformly related to IDU outcomes across different urban environments is unclear. We evaluated whether injection behaviour is differentially related to neighbourhood socioeconomic characteristics f...

background there is a high risk of tuberculosis (tb) infection among injecting drug users (idus). objectives this study aimed to determine the frequency of latent and active tb infection among idus. materials and methods in a cross-sectional study between 2008 and 2009, idus referred to the methadone maintenance treatment (mmt) centers in hamedan-iran, undergone tuberculin skin test (ppd; purif...

BACKGROUND Injection drug users (IDUs) are at high-risk for hepatitis B virus (HBV) and HIV. Due to concerns about non-adherence to multi-dose vaccine regimens however, IDUs are severely under-immunized against HBV and have been excluded from phase III trials of multi-dose candidate HIV vaccines in the United States. METHODS Through a randomized controlled trial, we compared the effectiveness...

AIM OF THE STUDY To assess the long-term hepatitis C (HCV) treatment outcome in former injecting drug users (IDUs). MATERIALS AND METHODS A long-term follow-up of 27 former IDUs who had been successfully treated for chronic hepatitis C was performed. These patients represented all IDUs who had obtained a sustained virological response in a Norwegian HCV treatment trial. The patients had been ...

AIMS To assess the effectiveness of a brief human immunodeficiency virus (HIV) testing and counseling intervention compared to a more time-consuming and expensive street-based intervention with injection drug users (IDUs). DESIGN Cross-over experimental design in which 900 IDUs were recruited, followed by a 'wash-out' period with no recruitment, a reversal of intervention assignment areas and...

Injection drug users (IDUs) were heavily affected by the tuberculosis (TB) resurgence in New York City in the 1990s. We assessed the effectiveness of screening for latent TB infection in methadone users and of selective treatment with isoniazid. Risk for future TB was classified as low or high on the basis of tuberculin, anergy, and HIV test results. The cohort of 2212 IDUs was followed up for ...

OBJECTIVES We investigated individual- and neighborhood-level factors associated with adolescent initiation of injection drug use. METHODS Injection drug users (IDUs) who had been injecting 2 to 5 years underwent HIV testing and completed a sociobehavioral risk survey. Modeling techniques accounting for intraneighborhood correlations were used in data analyses. RESULTS Adolescent-initiating...

BACKGROUND Injection drug use is a growing major public health concern. Injection drug users (IDUs) have a higher incidence of co-morbidities including HIV, Hepatitis, and other infections. An effective humoral response is critical for optimal homeostasis and protection from infection; however, the impact of injection heroin use on humoral immunity is poorly understood. We hypothesized that IDU...

INTRODUCTION In the last years, we observed an alarming increase in the number of newly diagnosed HIV infected intravenous drug users (IDUs) co-infected with hepatitis viruses or with severe bacterial infections. The aim of our study was to assess the incidence, the demographic and clinical characteristics of IDUs diagnosed with HIV, HCV and tuberculosis (TB). MATERIALS AND METHODS Prospectiv...

background hepatitis e virus (hev) infection is a self-limited hepatitis and the most common cause of acute adult hepatitis in asia. young adults and middle-aged populations are more likely to be infected than other age groups. objectives the aim of this study was to determine the seroprevalence of anti-hev among injection drug users (idus) compared to non-idus. patients and methods this was a ...