Community Network-Driven COVID-19 Testing in Vulnerable Populations (044)

The University of Chicago received a supplement from NIH Rapid Acceleration of Diagnostics Underserved Populations (RADx-UP) program to support the Community Network-Driven COVID-19 Testing of Vulnerable Populations in the Central US (C3) project to evaluate a COVID-19 testing approach that combines Social Network Testing Strategy (SNS) with community-developed public health messages. This study will focus on addressing misinformation, stigma, and distrust about COVID-19 testing and prevention among two populations that have been particularly hard hit by the pandemic: individuals involved in the criminal justice system that are not currently incarcerated and low-income Latinx individuals. The study will be conducted in rural and urban sites across Texas, Louisiana, Arkansas, Indiana, and Illinois. The goal of this study is to address challenges of current COVID-19 testing strategies which are limited by misinformation, stigma, distrust, and limited affirmation of ability to prevent COVID-19.

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Supportive Social Networks and Outcomes (024)

Social support networks have been an invaluable tool to combat addiction and other health interventions. The concept of social support networks as a powerful force in the health of substance users is well documented. Effective substance use disorder (SUD) and opioid use disorder (OUD) treatment approaches have been effectively combined with the inclusion of naturally-occurring support persons. The concept of organic social support has been under-utilized for retaining community members in SUD treatment programs.

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Re-Entry: Social Networks and Opioid Use (023)

Diverse communities enter the justice system, exit and re-enter to create a complex circulation driven by a number of social and structural factors. Often ignored are important social interactions that drive opioid use disorder (OUD) or methamphetamine use. Social learning and differential association theories hold that risky behaviors, including rationalizations for them, diffuse through social networks of close ties. Furthermore, network members influence behavior by virtue of the behavioral example they provide, the normative pressures they exert, and perceptions of these influences. If we understand how OUD/meth or recovery/renewed use moves through networks and their local geographic contexts, we will be able to develop new interventions, and determine previously unobserved mechanisms as to why interventions may fail or have success.

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In Silico JCOIN Trial Models (018)

Computational analogues of the JCOIN clinical research centers, so called in silico clinical trials, in the form of data-driven, agent-based network models (ABNMs), can provide a variety of simulation-based analyses to investigate longer-term health outcomes beyond the clinical trial timelines. Building on the Justice-Community Circulation Model (JCCM), the University of Chicago will apply the JCCM framework to develop in silico versions of JCOIN’s clinical research trials to run computational trials such as optimizing cross-study combinations of interventions or tracking additional and emerging outcome.

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Justice-Community Circulation Model (017)

The University of Chicago is developing an agent-based network model (ABNM) framework to study location-specific evolution and dynamics of opioid use disorder (OUD) in justice settings. The Justice Community Circulation Model framework is designed to help researchers and practitioners explore underlying mechanisms, epidemiological processes and interactions, such as the health and mortality pathways of individuals who experience non-fatal overdose or who initiate treatment, among justice-involved individuals with OUD.

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National Longitudinal Jail/Prison Survey (028)

Despite the effectiveness of medications for opioid use disorder (MOUD), there is a lack of information about what is currently available, accessible, and used throughout the jail and prison systems of the US. To better address this gap, the NORC at the University of Chicago will study how prisons and jails across 24 justictions are addressing opioid use disorder.

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Dynamic Network Collaboration Study (029)

The NORC at the University of Chicago, in partnership with the University of Texas Health Science Center at Houston, is conducting a longitudinal study to measure how collaborations and partnerships between researchers and practitioners within the JCOIN network change over time. The study will collect annual data over five years via online surveys and will be supplemented by automated web scraping to capture members’ publications, chapters, books, presentations, reports, and grants. Capturing changes in JCOIN members’ collaboration, productivity, publications, and grant activities will offer NIDA an opportunity to understand how collaborations within the JCOIN network improve when supporting a large network of substance abuse researchers and practitioners.

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AmeriSpeak Brief Opioid Stigma Survey (026)

To assess how stigma changes overtime, the NORC at the University of Chicago is conducting a study to measure public support for opioid use disorder (OUD) treatment, assess stigma associated with OUD, and perceptions of criminality around OUD. This study will use a nationally representative survey panel and will administer short surveys twice a year for a total of five years. The data collected from this study will allow for a better understanding of the public’s opinion on issues related to OUD, stigma, and the justice system and how perceptions change over time.

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AmeriSpeaks In-Depth Public Opinion Survey on Opioids (027)

The NORC at the University of Chicago is conducting a comprehensive study to measure the public’s view of policies, practices, attitudes and laws related to addressing opioids in justice settings across the U.S. This study builds on the topics from the JCOIN AmeriSpeak Brief Opioid Stigma Survey (026) and will also assess how support varies based on personal experiences with opioids or knowing someone who struggled with an OUD and variations by type of opioid and respondent characteristics.

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Mapping Federal Opioid Investments (025)

The University of Chicago is conducting a large-scale environmental scan of federally funded substance use-related initiatives and resources to understand how funds and resources are distributed across states. The study will also explore urban and rural differences, differences across areas based upon local drug-use epidemiology and availability of service resources and how federal funds are addressing opioid use disorders and other emerging drug-related challenges.

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