Project dates: September 2000 - November 2006
Co-Investigator: Leonard, Noelle
Mothers living with HIV (MLH) must sustain high quality parenting while coping with a chronic medical condition. At least 30 percent of MLH experience problem drinking, which may impair their abilities to meet parenting challenges, negotiate safer sex, and manage their health care and drug use. The goal of this project was to design, implement, and evaluate the Family First program (7 sessions on problem drinking, 7 sessions on parenting), an intervention for MLH with alcohol problems, many of whom also have drug use issues, who were raising adolescent children (aged 11-18 years). The intervention was tested in a randomized controlled trial where the control arm received a brief social/motivational intervention program. The study found that the intervention, which used a social cognitive and Motivational Interviewing approach, was effective in reducing alcohol and drug use and related problems, and also led to improvements in coping skills and mental health outcomes among mothers. The Family First intervention was particularly efficacious with participants with the highest levels of problem drinking. Effective interventions such as Family First have potential improve outcomes for mothers who are living with HIV and have alcohol and or drug use problems, and their adolescent children.
Abstract on NIH RePORTERBehavioral interventions for HIV infected and uninfected mothers with problem drinking
Addiction Research and Theory, 16 (1), 47-65. doi: 10.1080/16066350701651214.
Leonard NR, Gwadz MV, Cleland CM, Vekaria PC, Ferns B (2008).
Maternal substance use and HIV status: Adolescent risk and resilience
Journal of Adolescence, 31 (3), 389-405. doi: 10.1016/j.adolescence.2007.07.001. PMCID: PMC2713070.
Leonard NR, Gwadz MV, Arredondo GN, Riedel M, Rotko L, Hardcastle EJ, Potere JC (2007).
Description of a behavioral intervention to reduce substance use and related risk and increase positive parenting among urban mothers with alcohol and other drug problems
Journal of Child and Family Studies, 16 (4), 531-544. doi: 10.1007/s10826-006-9104-3.
Leonard NR, Gwadz MV, Cleland CM, Rotko L, Gostnell K (2007).
Physical and mental health functioning of urban HIV-infected and uninfected mothers with problem drinking
American Journal of Drug and Alcohol Abuse, 33 (3), 419-427. doi: 10.1080/00952990701313652.
de Guzman R, Leonard NR, Gwadz MV, Young R, Ritchie AS, Arredondo G, Riedel M (2006).
“I thought there was no hope for me”: A behavioral intervention for urban mothers with problem drinking
Qualitative Health Research, 16 (9), 1252-1266. doi: 10.1177/1049732306294080. PMCID: PMC2846429.