Sharing and Integrating HIV Client Data Across Provider Organizations to Improve Service Coordination

Recognizing the potential power of close collaboration, two federal programs that provide support to low-income people with human immunodeficiency virus (HIV)—the Housing Opportunities for Persons With AIDS program of the U.S. Department of Housing and Urban Development and the Ryan White HIV/AIDS Program, overseen by the Health Resources and Services Administration—came together to determine how they could improve outcomes for individuals with HIV who also experience housing instability. The result of that meeting was an effort to encourage more-effective data-sharing and coordination of services across the two programs. This data integration project was carried out with four local partnerships and evaluated by the RAND Corporation. As part of the evaluation, the authors developed this toolkit as a way to share lessons learned and help others who are considering similar efforts to share data across service providers. Although the integration of data systems might seem challenging, it can provide substantial gains in time saved for providers and improved service coordination. The toolkit's authors aim to demystify the process of data integration and make it more accessible to service organizations in general.