Faculty

Justin Alves, RN, FNP-BC, ACRN, CARN, CNE

Nurse Educator
Boston Medical Center
Boston, MA
(he/him/his)

Justin is a Clinical Nurse Educator for the State Technical Assistance and Treatment Expansion of Office Based Addiction Treatment (STATE OBAT) at Boston Medical Center, with specific expertise in infectious disease and their co-occurrence with substance use disorders, community outreach, and harm reduction. He serves as an expert on the Substance Use Disorder Care Continuum ECHO team, providing opioid addiction training and mentoring to health centers throughout the SUD care spectrum. He also sits on the item writing committee for the Addictions Nursing Certification Board, which oversees the accreditation of addiction nurses via the Certified Addictions Registered Nurse (CARN) and the Certified Addictions Registered Nurse-Advanced Practice (CARN-AP) examinations.

Justin has dedicated his career to caring for patients living with HIV/AIDS and suffering from substance use disorders across the continuum of care, working first in the community for a mobile health unit offering free HIV/STI testing and case management services and most recently as a staff nurse at Massachusetts General Hospital in the Infectious Disease Division. He is an AIDS Certified Registered Nurse, serving as the President of the Boston Association of Nurses in AIDS Care, and a Certified Addictions Registered Nurse, serving as the Vice-President of the Massachusetts Chapter of the International Nurses Society on Addictions. He is also the current President of the Gamma Epsilon Chapter of Sigma Theta Tau International Honor Society of Nursing.

Justin received his BSN from Northeastern University in 2013 and is currently in a MSN program at the University of Massachusetts-Dartmouth with a focus in nursing education.

Melinda Pipik, MS, FNP-BC

Family Nurse Practitioner
TCA Health
Chicago, IL
(she/her/hers)

With over 20 years' experience in health care, Melinda has an extensive background in educating patients on the prevention, detection, and treatment of sexually transmitted infections. Melinda has participated in the launching of HIV PrEP and nPEP services at two large organizations. Previously, Melinda worked for 5 years in the retail health setting at CVS MinuteClinic and was a member of the corporate-wide Sexual Health Peer Mentor Panel. Melinda currently sees patients in the primary care setting at TCA Health, a federally qualified health center in Chicago’s South Side.