Linda Brandt

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  AIDS Programs in Rural Minnesota May Lose Funding... - [Cached Version]
  Published on: 5/6/1999    Last Visited: 8/8/2001  

  Linda Brandt is the Director of the Rural AIDS Action Network , a group of professional volunteers which cares for people with HIV.The network recently lost 70 percent of its federal funding which is allocated through the State Department of Public Health.Brandt says the loss of funding means a loss of local support.Brandt : Our volunteers that we access are the AIDS-compassionate doctor , the AIDS-compassionate mental-health counselor , the AIDS-compassionate clergy.So that someone can call us and say , I'm from X County and I don't want anyone to know , but I do want to know who does care and who I could talk to if I get up the nerve?.So that potentially could end.The Rural AIDS Action Network gives out more than a 1 , 000 referrals a month to people affected by HIV.Brandt says she recently spoke to a mother who discovered her son is in a Twin Cities hospital with AIDS and she 's afraid to tell the rest of her family.Brandt gave her a list of people outside of her county who would drive to meet her and offer support.Brandt says it's a typical example of the fear and stigma surrounding HIV.Brandt : In rural towns there is a great fear that if someone is disclosed as a person with AIDS , that negative things will happen.That harassment will happen , that families will have businesses fail , that grandchild will be harmed , that verbal and physical abuse is possible.The fear level is unbelievable.A 1998 State Department of Health study found a number of barriers when it comes to effectively preventing the spread of HIV in rural areas.Fear of isolation and compromised confidential medical treatment often cause people in rural areas to go untreated for HIV , or head to the Twin Cities.John : Knowing the AIDS phobia and the reaction to it , I just felt more comfortable there.It was a hiding of sorts.

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  CAF: HIV Update Vol 3 No 15 - [Cached Version]
  Published on: 4/3/2002    Last Visited: 10/29/2007  

  But new cases in communities with fewer than 50,000 people are likely to be seriously under-reported, according to Linda Brandt, founder and executive director of the Rural AIDS Action Network (RAAN), headquartered in Minneapolis."It's really about 10-12 percent of new cases in Minnesota and surrounding states," says Brandt.

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  HIV Plus - [Cached Version]
  Published on: 8/1/2003    Last Visited: 6/25/2004  

  "There's so little prevention funding in Minnesota already that any cuts are going to have an enormous effect," says Linda Brandt, executive director of the Minneapolis-based Rural AIDS Action Network.While the organization supports the CDC's efforts to expand HIV antibody testing and has been conducting a rapid test outreach effort since November, Brandt says funds for such programs should not be diverted from traditional outreach."We have only $1.2 million for prevention efforts for the entire state's 4 million people," she says."That's about 25 cents per person.
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  However, Nelson and Brandt say the high level of counseling skill Glick reports in Chicago is not necessarily seen at health care facilities in other parts of the Midwest, particularly in small, rural communities, which make up the largest portion of the region.
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  Training, however, will not be available in every state, and even when it is conducted, there are no CDC funds to support it, Brandt says.
  
  "If we're going to start global testing, we need a massive educational effort and dollars to educate every physician, nurse-practitioner, physician assistant, and anyone else who may be administering the tests," she says.
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  But Brandt believes post-test counseling is just as important for people who test negative as it is for those who learn they are infected with the virus."It takes a lot of courage for a high-risk person to come in to take an HIV test," she says.

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  HIV/AIDS Nursing (June 2005) | Regional Knowledge Hub... - [Cached Version]
  Published on: 6/1/2005    Last Visited: 3/3/2009  

  International: Ms. Linda Brandt, RN, Consultant, Founder of Rural AIDS Action Network; Ms. Mary Jo O'Hara, RN, Consultant, University of Washington, USA; Ms. Irina Bakhtina, Director, Center of Post-Graduate Nursing Education, St. Petersburg, Russia;

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  HIV/AIDS in Rural America - [Cached Version]
  Published on: 10/3/1999    Last Visited: 9/5/2000  

  Linda BrandtMinneapolis, Minn
  
  Brandt is the founder and executive director of the Rural AIDS Action Network (RAAN), an organization committed to developing and sustaining caring volunteer communities that serve and support people living with, affected by, or at risk for HIV/AIDS in the rural Midwest.Brandt, a registered nurse, serves as a member of the Coalition for HIV/AIDS Housing Committee and the Association of Nurses in AIDS Care.

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  Knowledge Hub Newswire - Vol.1 No.1 (Summer 2005) |... - [Cached Version]
  Published on: 7/1/2005    Last Visited: 6/30/2009  

  Faculty included nurses from Ukraine, Russia, and the United States, including Linda Brandt, executive director and founder of Rural AIDS Action Network in Bemidji, Minnesota; Mary Jo O'Hara, a nurse consultant on HIV/AIDS issues affiliated with Washington University in Seattle, Washington; Larisa Golovoschuk, deputy chief physician in charge of nursing at the Kiev Family Medicine Scientific and Practical Center; Natalia Galapats, chief nurse at Zhovkva Central Rayon Hospital; and Irina Bakhtina, director of the Center of Post-Graduate Nursing Education in St. Petersburg, Russia.

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  Knowledge Hub Newswire - Vol.2 No.8 (Spring 2007) |... - [Cached Version]
  Published on: 4/1/2007    Last Visited: 6/30/2009  

  The Knowledge Hub expert Linda Brandt, Executive Director, Rural AIDS Action Network, will conduct training on case management development for Estonian caregivers. The training will be supported by funding from Global Fund program in Estonia.
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  The Knowledge Hub expert Linda Brandt, Executive Director, Rural AIDS Action Network, and Zoya Shabarova, Eurasia Regional HIV/AIDS Coordinator, AIHA, conducted one day mission to Estonia to discuss with national stakeholders and WHO country office the existing social support infrastructure for HIV care and the potential for introduction of case management function in Estonian AIDS services and outline a related training curricula.

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  MN HIV Services Planning Council - [Cached Version]
  Published on: 11/13/2001    Last Visited: 9/7/2006  

  Linda Brandt - excused

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  Minnesota Red Ribbon Ride :: QMinnesota.com - [Cached Version]
  Published on: 3/1/2003    Last Visited: 6/29/2009  

  "People used to think that rural sex was safe sex," says Linda Brandt, executive director and client service director of the Rural AIDS Action Network.
  
  Minneapolis-based Brandt founded RAAN in her basement in 1992 as a group of volunteers to organize and sustain communities of volunteers that can support and care for people living with, affected by, or at risk for HIV/AIDS in the rural midwest. The 20-member founding advisory group was scattered all over Minnesota. Today RAAN offers free and confidential testing, support groups, home health care, HIV medications, legal assistance, meals, housing, and much more.
  
  "We're culturally competent in rural Minnesota," Brandt says, "and proud of it."
  
  That means not asking people in rural areas to go public in order to get support. "We meet them where they find a comfort zone and we become the 'safety net' and buffer to the services they need," Brandt says.
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  A registered nurse, Brandt has worked in a variety of HIV/AIDS advocacy and educational roles. "I grew up in Decorah, Iowa," she says, "and felt a great connection to the pain and isolation that I found in persons living in rural Minnesota as a case manager.
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  Brandt says that the people behind RAAN are committed to continue as long as stigma and isolation exists. "Our volunteers know how to help even if we lose all our funding," she says.

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  National News - [Cached Version]
  Published on: 8/2/2001    Last Visited: 4/25/2002  

  according to Linda Brandt, founder and executive director of theRural AIDS Action Network (RAAN), headquartered in Minneapolis."It's really about 10-12 percent of new cases in Minnesota andsurrounding states," says Brandt."And it could be far morebecause cases are geographically assigned from where thediagnosis was made, and many diagnosed with AIDS return to therural communities where they were raised."The CDC also cautions that its surveillance reports are not"accurate" profiles.
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  for treatment, said Brandt.*Lack of experienced medical help - Rural patients with HIV areless likely to see a healthcare provider familiar with HIV/AIDSand are thus three times less likely to receive AIDS medicationsthan their urban counterparts.Denial - "Since you may lose your life as you know it when youhave AIDS in rural areas, there's a great chance of denial," said
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  Brandt."You can deny you're at risk, deny you had riskyexposures, and deny you have symptoms." Sex education in schools is far less likely in ruralcommunities.Only about 60 percent of rural teens use condoms.With treatment, a comprehensive approach to case management would
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  and funding treatment," said Brandt.
  
  See People on the Move for the list of the new Council members.
  
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