Background: People with opioid use disorder (OUD) have the highest rates of hepatitis C virus (HCV) infection. Despite the availability of curative HCV medication, people with OUD have limited health care access largely due to stigma. In a recent, pragmatic, randomized controlled trial (RCT), we compared a facilitated telemedicine intervention for HCV treatment integrated into opioid treatment programs (OTPs) with off-site referral. Facilitated telemedicine is bidirectional videoconferencing between a remote provider and a patient, supported by a case manager who facilitates the telemedicine encounter. The case manager schedules telemedicine visits, provides appointment reminders, and operates the digital equipment. Among 602 participants in the RCT, 90% (n=262) were cured through facilitated telemedicine and 39% (n=123) were cured through off-site referral. In this work, a multidisciplinary group of investigators, who directed the RCT, conducted a workshop, “Advancing Viral Hepatitis Screening and Treatment in Opioid Treatment Settings – Models & Resources,” at the American Association for Treatment of Opioid Dependence Conference in May 2024 to disseminate knowledge of facilitated telemedicine, including implementation considerations. We highlighted facilitated telemedicine as a patient-centered, sociotechnical, pragmatic health care delivery model for underserved populations. Objective: This study aimed to identify lessons learned to successfully overcome challenges of facilitated telemedicine implementation for HCV treatment integrated into OTPs. Methods: We partnered with the National Alliance of State and Territorial AIDS Directors in planning the workshop. The workshop consisted of 7 presentations on topics related to facilitated telemedicine implementation. The workshop was recorded and transcribed by Zoom (Zoom Communications). The transcripts served as data for the thematic analysis. The transcripts were interpreted to elucidate patterns of meanings and nuances derived from each presentation. In an iterative process, preliminary findings were compared and coalesced into themes. Verbatim quotes from the workshop were highlighted to support the themes. Results: We developed 3 themes. First, patient-centered care promotes HCV treatment for underserved populations through facilitated telemedicine. Case managers leveraged the destigmatizing environment of the OTP to build trust with patients, promoting an HCV cure through facilitated telemedicine. Second, sociotechnical approaches expand health care access for people with OUD. To be effective, facilitated telemedicine integrates 2 necessary components, a social aspect and a technical aspect. Third, facilitated telemedicine supports pragmatic research emphasizing people with OUD. Pragmatic research of facilitated telemedicine is needed to assess sustainability and scaling considerations beyond OTPs. Overall, we found that facilitated telemedicine overcame the digital divide, promoting access to digital technology, internet provision, and digital literacy. Conclusions: Facilitated telemedicine incorporates both a technical and a social component. The technical component largely addresses geographical challenges, while the social component addresses temporal (ie, care coordination) issues, promotes trust, and largely assuages patients’ concerns related to HCV treatment. The patient-centered, sociotechnical intervention can address the digital divide, thereby increasing health care access.

A suite of empirical Bayes methods to use in pharmacovigilance. Contains various model fitting and post-processing functions. For more details see Tan et al. (2025) , Koenker and Mizera (2014) and Efron (2016) .

Although opioid use disorder (OUD) and hepatitis C virus (HCV) frequently co-occur, few studies have evaluated substance use and social determinants of health (SDOH) that predict HCV treatment initiation and sustained virologic response (SVR). We used administrative and clinical trial outcome data from HCV-infected methadone-treated participants (n=522) to evaluate changes in substance use and SDOH associated with HCV treatment initiation and SVR. We performed random forest analysis for investigating factors that predict HCV treatment initiation and SVR. Additionally, we applied the factor analysis for mixed data method for dimensionality reduction and used a clustering method to divide participants into subgroups to assess individual and regional-level differences. HCV treatment approach (i.e., through telemedicine or referral), methadone duration, age, and degree of substance use correctly identified HCV treatment initiation in 75% and SVR in 94% of participants, respectively. Grouping participants based upon SDOH (first principal dimension), substance use (second dimension), and medical comorbidities, mental health disorders and demographics (third dimension) identified individual and regional level differences. We identified changes in substance use and SDOH associated with HCV treatment initiation and SVR. Individual and regional-level subgroup differences could guide intervention implementation. HCV treatment initiation and SVR lead to improvements, not only in liver and infectious diseases outcomes, but in social and substance use factors.

Even though several publicly accessible pharmacovigilance databases are available, extracting data from them is a technically challenging process. Existing tools typically focus on a single database. We present SurVigilance, an open-source tool that streamlines the process of retrieving safety data from seven major pharmacovigilance databases. SurVigilance provides a graphical user interface as well as functions for programmatic access, thus enabling integration into existing research workflows. SurVigilance utilizes a modular architecture to provide access to the heterogeneous sources. By reducing the technical barriers to accessing safety data, SurVigilance aims to facilitate pharmacovigilance research.