Substance Use & Misuse, 45:58–76 Copyright © 2010 Informa Healthcare USA, Inc. ISSN: 1082-6084 (print); 1532-2491 (online) DOI: 10.3109/10826080902864894 Hepatitis-C (HCV) Treatment Knowledge About Hepatitis-C Among Methadone Maintenance Treatment Patients in Israel RINAT COHEN-MORENO, 1,2 MIRIAM SCHIFF, 3 SHABTAY LEVITT, 2 RACHEL BAR-HAMBURGER, 4 SHIELA STRAUSS, 5 AND YEHUDA NEUMARK 1 1 Braun School of Public Health and Community Medicine, Hebrew University-Hadassah, Jerusalem, Israel 2 Methadone Treatment Clinic of Jerusalem, Jerusalem, Israel 3 Paul Baerwald School of Social Work and Social Welfare, Hebrew University of Jerusalem, Israel 4 Israel Anti-Drug Authority, Jerusalem, Israel 5 Muriel and Virginia Pless Center for Nursing Research, NYU College of Nursing, New York, New York, USA Ignorance about Hepatitis-C (HCV) among drug users, treatment staff, and policy makers thwarts treatment uptake and facilitates virus transmission. We assessed knowl- edge about HCV among methadone patients in Israel, where effective HCV-treatment is provided at low-cost within the national health insurance framework, yet few in- fected methadone patients are treated. In 2006, 512 patients in two methadone clinics in Israel were interviewed, of whom 53% were HCV-positive. The clinics were purposively selected from the 11 methadone clinics in the country. Respondents exhibited poor knowledge about HCV, particularly about diagnosis and treatment. Lesser-educated respondents were three times more likely to score low on HCV-knowledge compared to those with 12+ years of schooling (AOR = 2.97, 95% CI = 1.5–5.7. HCV-negative patients were also three-times more likely than HCV-positive patients to score low on the HCV-knowledge scale (Adjusted Odds Ratio = 3.0, 95% Confidence Interval = 1.9–4.7). Enhancing HCV-knowledge may help patients avoid becoming infected and The authors wish to thank Drs. S. Melnick and A. Basevitch of the Kaplan Medical Center, Rehovot, Dr. G. Morali of the Shaare Zedek Medical Center, Jerusalem, and Dr. Y. Herman of the Yaffo-Yassur Methadone Center,Tel Aviv, for reviewing drafts of thequestionnaire. Address correspondence to Yehuda Neumark, Ph.D., Braun School of Public Health and Com- munity Medicine, Hebrew University-Hadassah, P.O. Box 12272, Jerusalem 91120 Israel. E-mail: yehudan@ekmd.huji.ac.il. This study was conducted as the M.P.H. thesis project of RC-M who received a scholarship from the Anti-Drug Authority of Israel for this purpose. Dr. Strauss’ contribution was supported by a grant from the U.S. National Institute on Drug Abuse, R01DA013409. Conflict of Interest: All other authors declare that they have no conflicts of interest. 58