CITAR-The UTSPH Program for Advanced Training on AIDS Research

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Description (provided by applicant): The CITAR of the University of Texas School of Public Health (UTSPH) is a program for advanced training on HIV prevention research. Fellowships are for foreign health professionals leading to a 4 year doctoral degree at the UTSPH in Houston followed by a 5th post-doctoral year doing supervised research in their home country. Support for CITAR Fellows may come from a variety of sources but to date has been almost exclusively from the Vietnam Education Foundation (VEF) which provides 2 year of stipends and institutional support. An AITRP grant would support the remaining 3 years and travel expenses between Houston and our research and training sites in Vietnam. The goals of CITAR are: 1. Education & training of outstanding [foreign health professionals for research careers in public health in their home country on HIV and HIV related issues and to help them obtain funding to carry out those careers; 2. Foster research and research capacity in developing countries; 3. Promote understanding and cooperation between the United States and other countries. We chose Vietnam because the combination of the early but rapidly expanding AIDS epidemic, commitment of the Vietnamese government but severe limitations of its current public health manpower make it uniquely suited to benefit from our faculty who are highly experienced in AIDS research and international health. .Presently we have 7 Vietnamese Fellows (6 from VEF and 1 on a VN government scholarship) and 3 more VEF Fellows starting Fall 2005. We expect to have 2 to 4 new additional students in each subsequent year. There are 6 elements to the CITAR training experience: 1. Faculty supervised HIV field research leading to a thesis; 2. Didactic academic courses; 3. Weekly seminar in which faculty and fellows share presentations and discussions about HIV and related issues, 4. Practica; 5. Course on practical issues of international research, and; 6. Close mentoring of all aspects of the educational experience. A critical cross-cutting element will be ethics, focusing on the ethical conduct of science which will occur in all of the teaching elements. An AITRP would not only fit the philosophy and goals of CITAR for these Vietnam trainees, it would leverage Fogarty resources by supporting fellows already two years into their doctoral programs, with proven academic performance & commitment to research in Vietnam. We will hold student-faculty activities in VN aimed at successful reentry including short courses & VN based.