Principal Investigator
Dr. Marvin Belzer has spent over 28 years at the Division of Adolescent and Young Adult Medicine at Children’s Hospital Los Angeles and is Professor of Pediatrics and Medicine at USC Keck School of Medicine. He has been the Director/Division Chief at the division since 2008 which includes ten clinical and research faculty and over 100 staff and trainees and has programs targeting youth transitions to adult care, homeless and runaway youth, youth at-risk or living with HIV, transgender youth, teen parents, youth violence/gang reduction, substance abuse prevention and treatment and mental health services. Dr. Belzer is nationally known for his work with youth at-risk or infected with HIV and transgender youth. He directs one of the largest and most comprehensive youth HIV programs in the county that includes healthcare, HIV counseling and testing, and both individual and community level prevention interventions.
Dr. Belzer also directs a large HIV clinical trials and research program and has been part of the ATN since its inception in 2001 and was part of the NICHD funded REACH network prior to that. We offer a large number of collaborative NICHD funded and investigator initiated clinical trials, focusing on youth living with or at risk for HIV. Dr. Belzer’s primary area of research focuses on medication adherence. Dr. Belzer is currently the protocol lead for an NICHD/ATN Adherence intervention trial comparing text messaging with brief weekday support calls. He was also recently funded as co-PI on an NIDA RO1 focusing on patient navigation for young adults with HIV coming out of the criminal justice system. Dr. Belzer and his staff are have the largest Transgender Youth program in the US currently serving about 1000 patients and involved with several NIH studies evaluating the health status of youth initiating puberty suppression or cross sex hormones.
Institution: CHLA
Protocol: Tech Step
Site: Los Angeles
