Long Beach Health Department & UCLA Collaborate On Mobile Clinic

The City of Long Beach Department of Health and Human Services (Health Department) is participating in a new clinical study trial, in partnership with University of California, Los Angeles (UCLA) Health, to deliver health services to improve HIV and substance use outcomes. The mobile health clinic is temporarily located at the Multi-Service Center (MSC), which primarily serves people experiencing homelessness.

The study is a two-arm, randomized, controlled trial. Eligible participants are randomly chosen to either receive care at the mobile unit or receive peer navigation to community-based facilities. Participants receive these services for 26 weeks. The mobile unit provides medications for opioid use disorder, medications for treatment or prevention of HIV and care for sexually transmitted infections, hepatitis C and pertinent vaccinations. Participants in the active control arm receive navigation to these services in community-based facilities. 

This newest partnership is part of the City’s commitment to ending the HIV epidemic through the Long Beach HIV/STD Strategy 2019-2022 by identifying opportunities to collaborate to reduce new HIV infection among injection drug users and providing connections to care for HIV and STD treatment for those newly diagnosed. 

The trial, formally called HPTN 094, is funded by the National Institute on Drug Abuse, a component of the National Institutes of Health, U.S. Department of Health and Human Services. The study is exploring whether delivering integrated health services through mobile clinics can improve HIV and substance use outcomes among people with opioid use disorder who inject drugs as opposed to providing care from non-mobile, traditional brick and mortar facilities. The study is being conducted in five cities including Los Angeles (Long Beach), New York Philadelphia, Houston and Washington, D.C. Locally, the study is being conducted locally by Dr. David Goodman-Meza from the UCLA Center for Behavioral and Addiction Medicine.

The study started out in the field on June 14. The study team operates on Mondays through Wednesdays at the MSC while working with the MSC outreach team and other local HIV and substance use providers to identify a second location in Long Beach for the unit.