Healthy People Initiative (HPI)

Addictions do not occur in isolation. Tackling addictions requires addressing social determinants such as isolation, homelessness, marginalization, and unemployment. Research on individuals living with or at risk for HIV/AIDS highlights that unemployment correlates with higher levels of depression, anxiety, and social isolation compared to employment. In Ottawa, the PROMPT project engaged homeless or at-risk populations, including people who use drugs and those living with or at risk for HIV/AIDS or Hepatitis C using the Bridge ModelTM, a pragmatic community-based participatory action research approach operationalized through earlier projects at the Bridge Engagement Center in Ottawa, Canada. The PROMPT project demonstrated that implementing multi-component, complex interventions is both feasible and effective, achieving broader socio-economic outcomes beyond reduction and quitting tobacco and poly-substance use. However, PROMPT participants identified a lack of social and recovery capital -family and social connections, opportunities for volunteering and jobs- as a major barrier to recovery. To address this, we conducted a six-month feasibility pilot study with 20 PROMPT participants. By its conclusion, 15 participants were engaged in small paid or volunteer roles, including educational opportunities, fostering both social integration and recovery. Insights from this pilot study informed the design of a larger community-based multi-site pragmatic randomized trial (RCT) to further evaluate the effectiveness of the Bridge ModelTM, the Healthy People Initiative (HPI) project. The Healthy People Initiative (HPI) is a community-based, participatory, pragmatic parallel-arm multi-site with a cross-over design, recruiting 250 participants (16+) at risk of homelessness or low socioeconomic status in Ottawa and Toronto, Canada.