Seeking participants for research on people’s lived experience of hepatitis C cure
Late in 2020, researchers in the GLaD program began work on an important new project investigating people’s life experiences after treatment in this new age of direct-acting antivirals (DAAs) and in which the elimination of hepatitis C seems possible.
The core goal of the project is to better understand the impact that treatment with DAAs and achieving hepatitis C ‘cure’ has on individual people’s health and wellbeing. What are the needs of people living ‘post-cure’ lives? After treatment for hepatitis C, do people still experience hep C–related stigma and discrimination? The project aims to address the lived experience of people treated with DAAs, as well as the legal and policy dimensions of hepatitis C in a ‘post-cure’ world. Expected outcomes of the project include better legal, service, social and policy outcomes for Australians cured of hepatitis C, benefiting these individuals directly and society more broadly.
In order to gather a wide range of individual people’s stories and perspectives about life after hepatitis C treatments, we have now moved into a targeted period of interviewing. We are conducting confidential interviews with people who have been treated for hepatitis C with DAAs. All interview participants are reimbursed for their time and contribution to the research.
We are currently recruiting individuals in Victoria, New South Wales and Queensland who have been treated for hepatitis C. Anyone who fits this description is welcome to get in touch with us directly. We are particularly interested in talking to people who:
- Have been treated with DAAs in prison or other custodial settings
- Identify as Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander and have undergone treatment with DAAs
- Have been treated with DAAs multiple times
- Experienced older (‘interferon-era’) treatments and then were later treated with DAAs
- Identify as non-binary or gender-diverse
If you have any questions about this project, are interested in taking part, or can help us reach out to people in these groups to ensure they are well represented in our analysis, please contact:
Dr Dion Kagan
mobile: + 0415 325 270 | landline: +61 3 9479 2046 | email: d.kagan@latrobe.edu.au