Recruiting

SHIELD Training

Sponsor:

Johns Hopkins Bloomberg School of Public Health

Code:

NCT07804121

Conditions

HIV

Substance Use Disorder (SUD)

Eligibility Criteria

Sex: All

Age: 18+

Healthy Volunteers: Accepted

Interventions

SHIELD 2.0

Study Details

Brief summary:

The project is a pragmatic, quasi-experimental hybrid type II effectiveness-implementation trial of a structural HIV prevention intervention to address police behavior (arrests and referrals) and ultimately improve health among people who use drugs. The study involves a novel implementation strategy that engages behavioral health workers as "local champions" in the delivery of an evidence-based police education program (SHIELD training intervention). In addition to examining implementation outcomes, primary outcomes focus on assessing effectiveness of the intervention among police (specifically in reducing drug-related arrests and promoting referrals to Medications for Opioid Use Disorder (MOUD) treatment. The investigator's overarching effectiveness hypothesis is that after law enforcement organizations receive the SHIELD training intervention, they will be more likely to refer people who use drugs to MOUD treatment and other health and social services, rather than arresting them for low level possession offenses. The study will be conducted across different counties in Appalachian Kentucky.

Conditions

HIV

Substance Use Disorder (SUD)

Study ID

NCT07804121

Start date

Jun 25, 2026

Status verified date

Sep, 2026

Completion date

Apr 30, 2029

Anticipated

Primary completion date

Dec 31, 2027

Anticipated

Eligibility Criteria

Eligibility Criteria

Sex: All

Age: 18+

Healthy Volunteers: Accepted

Inclusion Criteria:

  • An adult over the age of 18 years old
  • Currently employed in a law enforcement agency in one of the nine counties participating in the trial

Exclusion Criteria:

  • Only adult participants over the age of 18 will be recruited into the study, and we will not restrict eligibility based on gender, race, or any other socio-demographic characteristics.

Study Design

Enrollment

150 participants

Anticipated

Intervention Model

Single group

Primary purpose

Other

Interventions and Outcome Measures

Arms

experimental: SHIELD 2.0

SHIELD is an evidence-based police education training program. Participants in this study are law enforcement officers who will receive the SHIELD training modules.

Interventions

SHIELD 2.0

SHIELD is an evidence-based police education training program that has been demonstrated to change police behavior (arrest and referrals) and improve outcomes among police and people who use drugs in NIH-funded and other research studies. The original intervention delivery relied on academic teams, limiting sustainability and scalability. Our novel "SHIELD 2.0" implementation strategy aims to address these limitations by capacitating the local behavioral health workforce to implement the steps of the SHIELD process, specifically to complete the delivery of the SHIELD intervention to local police officers.

Primary outcome measure

  • Frequency of Law enforcement officer self-reported referrals to MOUD [ Time Frame: From baseline up to 12 months post SHIELD training ]
  • Frequency of Law enforcement officer self-reported drug-related arrests [ Time Frame: From baseline up to 12 months post SHIELD training ]

Central Contacts and Locations

Central contacts

Zach R Salazar, MPH

8132307741zachrsalazar@jhu.edu

Skylar M Chapdelaine, BA

4138961552schapde1@jh.edu

Locations

University of Kentucky

Recruiting

Lexington, Kentucky, United States, 40506

Contacts

Carol White, MPH

859-562-2684crwhit3@uky.edu

Jennifer Havens, PhD

859-323-6553Jennifer.Havens@uky.edu

Principal Investigator:

Jennifer Havens, PhD

More Information

Sponsor

Johns Hopkins Bloomberg School of Public Health

Last update posted

Sep 4, 2026

Last verified

Sep, 2026

Trial information was received from ClinicalTrials.gov and was last updated on 2026-09-10. This information was provided to ClinicalTrials.gov by Johns Hopkins Bloomberg School of Public Health on 2026-09-04.