History

NIAID and NIMH have a long history working together to promote integration of behavioral and biomedical research. The timeline below illustrates many of the major meetings and activities conducted by the NIAID-NIMH BSSPT to advance HIV behavioral and social science alongside HIV biomedical trials. Early efforts began in 2009 with a workshop sponsored by the Division of AIDS (DAIDS), National Institute of Allergy and Infectious Diseases (NIAID), NIH. The workshop was entitled “Behavioral and Social Sciences in HIV Vaccine Clinical Research.” To further extend and advance this early effort, the BSS Project Team (BSSPT) was formed to enhance the integration of BSS into biomedical HIV clinical research, including clinical trials of HIV vaccines, non-vaccine prevention, therapeutics, and cure research. BSSPT members come from the NIAID DAIDS Office of the Director, Vaccine Research Program, Prevention Sciences Program, Therapuetic Research Program, and the National Institute of Mental Health (NIMH) and the Division of AIDS Research (DAR). A series of joint workshops and consultations followed in 2011, 2012 and 2014, culminating in a document entitled “Behavioral and Social Sciences in HIV Prevention Clinical Trials: Points to Consider in Designing and Undertaking Research.” To download a copy of this document click here. Since then the BSSPT has created promotional materials to further our mission, including our:

• Behavioral and Social Science in Biomedical HIV Clinical Trials
• Strengthening Adherence in HIV Biomedical Clinical Research
• Risk Assessment in HIV Biomedical Clinical Research