Vaccines can not only prevent HIV, but they may also help treat HIV.
By volunteering for a clinical study, you can help researchers learn more about how to develop vaccines that could be used for treatment and prevention.
Become a volunteer
You may already know that that vaccines can prevent disease by preparing the immune system to fight a virus if exposed to it. But they can also be used therapeutically to treat an illness, such as the vaccines for rabies and tetanus.
Studying an HIV vaccine in people living with HIV may help to identify new methods to treat HIV, and can also help researchers better understand what happens in the immune system. That could provide important information about how to better design and manufacture vaccines that are later used for prevention.
A vaccine teaches the body to prevent a particular infection or fight a disease. In order to develop a vaccine, researchers need to test it in people. A vaccine study tests whether the vaccine is safe (does not cause health problems) and whether people’s immune systems respond to the study vaccine (known as an “immune response”) in a way that prevents or treats an infection or disease. Researchers only need to test a vaccine in a small number of people to learn if the immune system responds to it. If a study vaccine produces the desired immune responses, this helps researchers decide whether to do more studies of the vaccine. It takes many vaccine studies to produce a safe, effective vaccine.
Currently, there is no licensed vaccine against HIV or AIDS.
There are prevention studies for people living with and without HIV.
By filling out the survey and joining the Red Ribbon Registry, a research site in your area will be able to contact you if they have a study they feel is appropriate for you.
Protecting the healh and respecting the rights of participants are top priorities for everyone in the NIAID research networks. Without volunteers, we would never be able to find vaccines, treatments, or other new ways to prevent HIV.
A first step in protecting the rights of study participants is to give them information about the study before they join. Clinic staff will give volunteers information about the study product and procedures, the possible risks and benefits to participants, and the rights that participants have. These rights include the right to receive any new information about the study that could affect whether a participant wants to remain in the study, and the right to leave the study at any time.
During the study, the clinic staff will monitor participants to make sure the products being tested are not causing any health problems. Clinic staff members will also ask participants about any social problems they may have from being in the study, and will help participants to resolve them and will provide referrals for any necessary care or support.
The registry is made up of volunteers committed to ending the HIV epidemic by participating in HIV clincial studies.
By joining the registry, you will partner with researchers and help advance science against one of its greatest challenges.The registry allows researchers to quickly find people who might be a good fit for a study based on age, location, health factors and other criteria. The registry is made possible through grant support from the National Institutes of Health (NIH).
To join the registry first complete the online health survey. Then, researchers at a study clinic in your area will be able to contact you when they have a study that may be a good fit for you. You might be contacted immediately, in a few months, or even a year. Once you are contacted, you can get all your questions answered before deciding whether to participate.
The National Institute of Allergy and Infectious Diseases (NIAID) funds 4 research networks in its Division of AIDS, including the HIV Vaccine Trials Network (HVTN). AIDS Clinical Trials Group (ACTG), HIV Prevention Trials Network (HPTN), and International Maternal Pediatric Adolescent AIDS Clinical Trials (IMPAACT). NIAID is part of the National Institutes of Health (NIH), which is part of the United States government. The research networks are collaborations of scientists, educators, and community members searching for an effective and safe HIV vaccine.
