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“Bringing together HIV specialists
from the Balkan countries was an excellent idea. I believe that
this will be the first step of intense collaboration and hard work
for the benefit of HIV/AIDS patients in the future.”
Deniz Gökengin, Izmir, Turkey, (Belgrade
training, May 2007)
HIV in South East Europe II:
Working together for progress
“South East Europe needs more positive attention”
6 - 8 May 2009, Istanbul, Turkey
Doctor chairs: Drs Deniz Gökengin, Izmir; Prof
Josip Begovac, Zagreb
Patient advocate chairs: Arzu Kayki and Tekin Tutar (Pozitif Yaşam
Derneği, Istanbul); Simon Collins (HIV i-Base, London)
training | programme | forums | trainers | photos | presentations | report | testimonials
 Mitja Blažić
Mitja is a freelance journalist, working mainly with the 1st Program of Radio Slovenia, covering social issues with special attention to sex behavioural themes. He is also on the editorial board for Narobe – an LGBT magazine – covering AIDS, activism and other issues. He is also working as a Compass (Council of Europe) human rights trainer.
Mitja is an activist for LGBT human rights and AIDS and is a board member for DIH (the Association for the Integration of Homosexuality) in Slovenia. He’s a member of the Slovene National AIDS Committee and is helping to prepare the Slovenian National Strategy for HIV/AIDS Prevention 2010-2014. Mitja also coorganises the Slovenian Pride Parade.
 Snezana Brkic
Snezana Brkic, MD, PhD is Assistant Professor on the University Medical School Novi Sad, Cathedra for infectious diseases and head of HIV Department. Dr Brkic started to work with HIV patients as a member of one nongovernmental organization helping PLHIV, and educating volunteers at the beginning of 1999. After that, she started to educate herself passing a great number of seminars and clinical courses, including fellowships in USA, USC and Royal Free Hospital London, two seminars of EACS, PAEC Course in Los Angeles and Belgrade etc.
In 2004 Snezana was coordinator of a Serbian educational team which educated more than 2000 medical workers in Serbia about HIV and AIDS. In 2006 and 2007 she was on call teacher for regional project given by UNODC about educating inspectors for organized crime about HIV and AIDS in Ankara. Following that she continues to cooperate with Global Fund and with their grant, she helped to reconstruct the old Infectious Diseases Clinic for an HIV/AIDS Department which was officially opened for patients on 16.4.2008. Now, this has 3 plus potentially 2 beds, and about 100 patients.
Ben Collins
Ben Collins is co-founder of HIVTRI. He became involved in HIV work in 1985, first as a volunteer and then a staff person at Project Inform, a San Francisco-based HIV treatment information and advocacy organisation. Since leaving there in 1998 he has served as an organisational consultant for HIV and other progressive groups both in the US and the UK where he now lives. Ben has been HIV+ since 1981 .
Donald De Korte Donald de Korte is responsible for External Affairs and Strategic Planning for MSD in Central Eastern Europe, Middle East, and Africa. Prior to this position, Donald supported the development an implementation of Merck's social corporate responsibility strategies in HIV/AIDS.
In 2000, Donald established the African comprehensive HIV/AIDS Partnerships (ACHAP), a collaborative effort between the Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation, Merck & Co., Inc., the Merck Company Foundation, and the Government of Botswana. ACHAP is a unique public-private partnership concentrating on the development and implementation of a national comprehensive HIV/AIDS Strategy in Botswana, a country with the highest recorded HIV prevalence. Other programs included the Blueprint for Business Action, concentrating on HIV workplace programs, and several other community-based HIV/AIDS programs in different settings.
Donald is of Dutch nationality, and holds a Medical Doctor and Bachelor of Science degree (pharmacology) from the University of Amsterdam, in addition to a Bachelor degree from the Dutch Institute of Marketing.
 Smiljka De Lussigny
Smiljka de Lussigny was the acting Executive Director at the European AIDS Treatment Group, a pan-European network based in Brussels. She studied pharmacy at the Moscow Medical Academy. Smiljka has been involved in the HIV field since 1999, working on prevention programs and sexual and reproductive health and rights projects for vulnerable youth. She joined the European AIDS Treatment Group as a member in 2001, and ever since stayed devoted to improving access to HIV treatment and care in Europe and globally.
Having had lived in Russia for more than 6 years, Smiljka has predominantly been involved in programs related to Eastern Europe. Today, Smiljka continues her involvement in HIV issues in Europe, while adding a broader perspective of public health to it. She is finalizing a Master of Public Health programme in Lund University, Sweden.
 Ann Deschamps
Since 1996, Ann has worked as a Clinical Nurse Specialist HIV at the University Hospitals of Leuven, (Belgium) with over 600 HIV patients (adults and children) in follow up. At first focus was delivering patient care and building up from scratch the HIV-care program together with the doctors, social worker, psychologist and nutritionist. Ann developed a medical-nursing database to keep track of the clinical and personal data of patients and has also developed a well structured adherence counseling program with outstanding patient outcome.
Ann also teaches within the “Advanced Nursing Practice” course as a guest lecturer at the Master Nursing program in Leuven and Ghent, Belgium and Basel, Switzerland. She recently joined the steering committee of European HIV Nursing Network (EHNN) which has the aim of uniting nurses across Europe and supporting/educating them in their patient care.
Ann is involved in nursing research and looking for further international research collaboration to develop a well validated easy to use instrument to predict virological failure within 1 year which will be used as screening tool, so that at risk patients can be deferred for further counseling and adherence enhancing interventions.
 Alina Dumitriu
Alina Dumitriu started to work in the HIV field 4 years ago. She works a coach/mentor within Romanian Angel Appeal Foundation and the Association of PLWHA, SENS POZITIV. Alina has learned a lot about HIV, treatment and its side effects, interactions, how to have a healthy life living with HIV, pregnancy and HIV, and any other information that can improve the life with HIV. The VCT direct PLWHA to Alina as the mentor in the hospital and she has the multidisciplinary teams within hospitals as collaborators.
The Romanian Angel Appeal Foundation is monitoring 15 YPLHIV to facilitate the formation of relevant skills that would aid HIV affected young people in their workforce inclusion. Alina coaches them from being adherent to ARV treatment up to managing at the place they work in. She is also a lobbyist and advocate with SENS POZITIV – with groups and individuals – working to change legislation because it is interpretative and the authorities easily discriminate PLWHA because of that "etc" at the end of the law articles.
Alina is the chairman of RoCAB – the Romanian Community Advisory Board and member in steering committee in HIV Europe Network. She is also a member of the government commission “National Commission of surveillance, control and prevention of HIV/AIDS cases”. Alina worked for a 6 month period in Harm Reduction activities as an outreach worker within the “Integration Asociation”, the only non-governmental organization from Bucharest, Romania, founded by former drug users and harm reduction professionals.
 David Haerry
David is the Coordinator for Training and Education for the European AIDS Treatment Network (NEAT). He is a co-author and online editor for the database run by the International AIDS Society on travel and residency restrictions for PWHA, as well as undertaking consultancy work with the International AIDS Vaccine Initiative in Amsterdam. David has been active in the European AIDS Treatment Group (EATG) since 2004 and is currently a member of the European Community Advisory Board (ECAB) and the EATG’s policy and development & membership working groups.
As a patient member and expert patient for the European Medicines Agency (EMEA) and as a member on various other committees and boards for clinical practice, treatment activism and support agencies, David has wide experience in the management of HIV and the support and care for PWHA.
 Arzu Kayki
After gaining a BSc in Environmental Engineering at the Istanbul Technical University and an MSc in Industrial Engineering at the Bosphorous University, Arzu worked in this field before changing careers in 2004. Arzu was a communications and fundraising coordinator for the Community Volunteers Association and then project coordinator for a leadership building programme for volunteers. She moved into HIV support when she became coordinator for the Positive Living Support Centre for PLHIV in Turkey in 2006.
Since then, Arzu has become a Board Member, coordinated projects supporting PLA and developed anti-discriminatory campaigns in Turkey. In September 2008, Arzu co-chaired the HIVTRI HIV in South East Europe medical training for doctors and she is co-chair of the current event. She also works as a freelance trainer and moderator.
 Silven Konov
Svilen Konov currently works for HIV i-Base as a treatment counsellor. He is also a member of the UK HIV Drug Resistance Database steering committee and a member of the DSMBs several clinical studies – both organised by academic institutions, as well as pharmaceutical companies. Svilen has experience in working on international projects with the EU, EMEA, EATG (European AIDS Treatment Group), notably in the EE/CA region. He has been the editor of the Russian version of the EATN (European AIDS Treatment News). Svilen has a degree from the London School of Hygiene and Tropical Medicine. His current interests are in mathematical modelling, clinical trials design and pharmacogenomics.
Eileen Nixon
Eileen Nixon is currently an HIV Nurse Consultant at Brighton and Sussex University Hospitals, Brighton, UK. Her responsibilities include establishing and delivering nurse-led HIV patient care to increase capacity and patient access to services. She is also responsible for implementing HIV clinical pathways across Brighton and Sussex University Hospitals and for establishing a strategy for cohesive nursing practice across the planned HIV Managed Service Network in Surrey, Sussex and Kent. Eileen is also an honorary lecturer at the University of Brighton and is actively involved in the planning and delivery of specialist HIV nursing courses. On a clinical level, Eileen delivers nurse-led clinics for people with HIV who are essentially stable on HIV therapy but who have complex multiple health or social care needs. She is also the lead for HIV PEP for occupational and sexual exposures. She is chief investigator for a hospital -wide nursing research study on infection control.
Eileen is currently on the Executive Committee for the UK National HIV Nurses Association (NHIVNA) and led the working group for the development of National HIV nursing competencies that were published in June 2007. Eileen has established an HIV Nurse Education programme in University Teaching Hospital in Lusaka, Zambia and continues to have ongoing input into this project that is being rolled out to district health facilities.
 Can Pekkara
Can is one of the founders and supporters of the Positive Living Association, which is one and the only NGO supporting PLHIV in Turkey with projects to have better access to treatment, to improve life standards, to strengthen PLHIV physically, psychologically and socially, and to carry out advocacy activities against stigma and discrimination. He is a volunteer and vice president of PLA since 2007. He is still preparing HIV/AIDS related reports for local NGOs and WHO, also representing Turkey at international meetings and conferences.
Can graduated from İstanbul University with a degree in Business Administration & Economics before getting his MBA Degree on Consumer Behaviour and Marketing Research in 2001.
Following this in 2002 Can established an interior design and architecture company with a partner, before being diagnosed in 2006 with HIV-HCV coinfection while doctors were looking for lymphatic cancer.
 Nenad Petkovic
Nenad Petkovic is a lawyer, specialising in human rights. For six years he is a civil society activist mainly as an advocate for rights of PLHIV. He is editor of the website “www.aidsresurs.rs” and author/editor of several publications on human rights and HIV/AIDS, patient’s rights and ARV treatment literacy.
From 2007, he is a coordinator of ARV Treatment literacy project in Serbia. Currently, Nenad is vice president of the patient organization Q-Club and a Steering committee member of HIV Europe.
Ranko Petrovic
Ranko Petrovic has been involved in HIV/AIDS work since 1994. Based on experience gathered in a Serbian NGO dealing with HIV, he was selected in 2001 for the first UNAIDS Focal Point for Serbia and Montenegro. Within this post he facilitated a number of country and local level processes, in line with the UNAIDS Three Ones Principle. Some of the most important topics were development of the AIDS Strategy, establishment of the M&E System on HIV/AIDS, establishment of multisectoral AIDS Commissions, development of three succesful applications for GFATM, introduction of new and innovative approaches in the country’s HIV/AIDS response, support to PLHIV, fighting for the role of NGOs in reaching most at risk populations with preventive interventions.
From 2006 he continued his career as HIV/AIDS Specialist within the UNICEF Offce in Bosnia and Herzegovina. There he continued to work on development of appropriate preventive interventions for those at risk as well as policies which should improve access to information and health services. He coordinated implementation of bio-behavioural studies among IDUs and adolescents in collective accommodations and provided technical support to the study among MSMs and SWs with the purpose of obtaining baseline data on core indicators related to these groups. Parallel to his assignment at UNICEF, he also performed duties of the UNAIDS Focal Point for Bosnia and Herzegovina from 2006 till 2009. From 2009 he has worked as an consultant on HIV and other health topics. Ranko Petrovic is a Doctor of Dentistry, pending Specialisation in Social Medicine.
Mario Poljak
Professor Mario Poljak gained his MD at the University of Zagreb, Croatia, and PhD at the University of Ljubljana, Slovenia, before specialising in clinical microbiology. He is currently Professor of Microbiology and Immunology at Faculty of Medicine, University of Ljubljana and Head of Laboratory for Molecular Microbiology and Slovenian HIV/AIDS Reference Centre, Institute of Microbiology and Immunology, Faculty of Medicine, University of Ljubljana, Slovenia. His laboratory offers daily 80 different virological molecular and serological diagnostic assays.
Dr. Poljak’s research concentrates on the development of new molecular diagnostic methods, improvement and evaluation of virological methods/assays, isolation of DNA from archival and complicated clinical specimens, role of human papillomaviruses (HPV) in the pathogenesis of different benign and malignant tumours, etiopathogenesis of head and neck carcinomas and benign tumours, intrahospital and unusual transmission of blood-born microorganisms and genetic heterogeneity of blood-born microorganisms, HPV, H. pylori and M. tuberculosis.
He is author of 117 research articles published in Science Citation Index (SCI) cited journals, 70 research articles published in other journals, 93 published full-text lectures and 286 abstracts from different scientific conferences. His articles have been cited more than 900 times in SCI-indexed journals. As invited speaker he gave more than 80 lectures at several scientific meetings. He is Editor of Acta Dermatovenerologica APA, Editorial Board member of Journal of Clinical Virology and International Journal of Virology and Advisory Board member of Scandinavian Journal of Clinical & Laboratory Investigation. He serves as peer reviewer for more than 50 scientific journals.
 Simon Portsmouth
Simon is a medical advisor for Pfizer UK working on HIV medicines. He also holds the post of honorary consultant at St Thomas’ Hospital London. Prior to joining Pfizer, Simon was consultant and lead clinician in HIV medicine at St Mary’s Hospital London. Simon graduated in medicine from Sheffield University in 1992 and trained in GU/HIV at UCH. He then did an MD at the Chelsea and Westminster Hospital, with a thesis on immune responses to Kaposi’s sarcoma herpes virus.
Milena Stevanovic
Dr Milena Stevanovic graduated Medical Faculty at University St. Cyril and Methodius in 1996 and finished a residency in infectious diseases in 2003. Since 1999 she is employed as a medical doctor at the University Clinic for Infectious Diseases, at the Department for HIV/AIDS. She introduced antiretroviral treatment in RA. Macedonia and she is actively engaged in clinical treatment of people living with HIV/AIDS, their counseling, support and care. As a part of her clinical work, she is also involved in ongoing research activities as well as education of medical and dentistry students.
Apart from her clinical work, in 2000, Milena established a nongovernmental organization HERA (Health Education and Research Association) for prevention on HIV/STIs. In 2003 she had also initiated a first Voluntary Counseling and HIV Testing network in the country. Currently Milena is a National Coordinator for HIV/AIDS in Macedonia, and she is also an active member of several international organizations such as EATG (European Aids Treatment Group) and EACS.
Tekin Tutar
Tekin majored in Maritime Business and Administration in 1999, and thereafter worked in the field of logistics until he was diagnosed HIV positive in 2004. After his diagnosis, he lived in isolation for approximately two years, during which time he also stopped working because of HIV-related psychological disorders. Having accepted the antiretroviral therapy (ART) in 2006, he started to observe lots of positive changes in his life. In 2007, Tekin started to work at Istanbul-based advocacy and support NGO for PLHIV, the Positive Living Association. Since then, he has been working as a peer consultant and has provided consultancy for nearly 400 PLHIV, as well as a Case Manager and Treatment Activist. Currently, he is also coordinating a Project, which aims to reach PLHIV in 10 rural cities of Turkey to empower them physically, psychologically, and socially after their needs are addressed.
Jennifer Watt
Jennifer Watt is Director, International Access Operations for Gilead Sciences, based in London, UK. In this role she helps facilitate access to the HIV medicines Viread and Truvada in 80 countries in Africa, South East and Eastern Europe, and Central Asia. Jennifer also helps manage access to AmBisome for the treatment of visceral leishmaniasis, a neglected tropical disease, in developing countries. Previously, Jennifer worked in European and US commercial operations for Gilead, strategy management consulting for Accenture, and product development for Kimberly-Clark. She holds an MBA from University of California, Berkeley, and Bachelors of Science in Chemical Engineering from University of Virginia.
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