Research
PIH’s mission, to bring the benefits of modern medicine to the world’s most vulnerable communities, relies on our research. By leading, facilitating, and conducting rigorous research and sharing the results, we not only continually improve care delivery in the communities we serve, but also push governments and global powers toward more equitable health policies.
Our research spans the globe and is strengthened by the Global Health Delivery Partnership, our collaboration with Harvard Medical School and Brigham and Women’s Hospital that allows us to leverage leading academic and clinical resources. With our partners, we test new models and approaches to care, find innovative solutions to age-old problems, then share that knowledge through publication in esteemed medical journals--all of which influences our global advocacy.
Impact and Influence
In 1998, PIH launched the HIV Equity Initiative, which provided antiretroviral therapy—then considered too expensive and complicated to use in poor communities—to a small group of HIV-positive patients in Haiti. All of the patients regained their health; those on their deathbeds survived. A 2001 research article published in the Lancet detailed these results and shared with the global health community what PIH had proven: High-quality HIV care could be delivered to people living in the world’s poorest regions.
Activists, government officials, and leaders of organizations like the Global Fund, PEPFAR, and the World Health Organization took note and directed extensive funding to global HIV care. So began the greatest HIV interventions in history. As a result, today more patients than ever before are accessing the lifesaving medication that, without PIH’s example and resulting research publication, would otherwise have remained out of reach.
We lead the endTB project, a multilateral partnership that is increasing access to modern multidrug-resistant tuberculosis treatments for patients around the world, while conducting international clinical trials to find shorter, simpler, less toxic drug regimens.
In Haiti, publication on our successful cholera vaccination campaigns inspired the World Health Organization to create a global stockpile of the oral vaccine.
In Mexico, our research on the impact of community health workers proves how these key staff improve adherence to medication among diabetes and hypertension patients.
In Peru, our cutting-edge laboratory provides a space for the study of how tuberculosis spreads.
And in Rwanda, our multi-year study of HIV patients received international attention for demonstrating how to improve treatment effectiveness.
