Our primary goal in the HIV Clinic is to take care of HIV-infected patients, to give them the best care possible, and make sure they feel that they are safe and invested in their own health care. We want every patient to understand their HIV disease, so that they live a very, very long, healthy life with HIV.
Good morning. How are you doing? Are you checking in for an appointment today?
Yes, I am.
Whenever one of our patients comes to the HIV Clinic, they will have the benefit of many different team members being involved in their care. They have a familiar desk attendant, who will check them in and make sure that they're available and ready for their appointments. They will see an HIV trained physician. They'll see an HIV trained pharmacist, HIV trained nurses, HIV trained social workers and case workers, who are all part of the patient's HIV care.
We do take a full, multidisciplinary approach to taking care of the patient. We all discuss the patient. We all offer our own insights about specific things that we think would contribute to their care, and collectively make up a plan that's going to be in the patient's best interests.
We bring in all our capabilities to focus on providing good care to patients, and have of a well-trained and motivated health care workforce.
We come together to try to make the best decision for the patient. We're making sure that the perspective of a patient is also heard.
We've been working with HIV since the very beginning of the epidemic in the 1980s. And we understand the need for caring for our patients, but also protecting their privacy.
Education is a pivotal part of Mayo Clinic as a whole. It's been a part of our history for over 150 years. And that very much translates into our HIV Clinic. We have ongoing educational programs to make sure that the team truly is at the cutting edge and able to provide the best care to our HIV patients.
People look to Mayo Clinic for analysis, including education and training. We have been busy in providing that education and training worldwide.
We are educating other health practitioners, educating other allied health staff, educating students. We want to make sure that they have all the tools, all the knowledge, all the ability to take care of these patients and manage their medications.
We feel a strong commitment to be involved in research at the Mayo HIV Clinic at all levels. Because we feel a need not only to understand our patient, but also to understand the disease, so we can help our patients and we can help society to eventually cure and care for all of our HIV patients.
Research is a very important part of HIV, and it has been for years.
The fundamental goal of the lab is to understand how HIV causes disease, and how we can take advantage of the knowledge we gain in how it causes disease to come up with new treatment strategy.
That knowledge is an important knowledge. And being part of that activity will enhance our effectiveness in providing care.
HIV, at present, is basically a chronic disease. People who are on treatment can expect to live a regular length of time. For this to happen, those who are infected have to be diagnosed. And those who are diagnosed have to be linked to care, and receive treatment, and stay in care.
There's a lot of resources available to make sure you can get the care that you need. And just being in touch with a clinic and a care team that's aware of all those, we can channel you in where you need to be and make sure you get everything you need to take care of you.
Any person can walk in the door, and with our magical social workers, we'll take care of the dirty work for you.
There will never be a phone call, a letter written, medications sent that has the words HIV on them. Just come here and we'll get you treated. It's for everybody. Anybody with HIV, come in, and we'll take care of it once you get here.