K24 Mentoring Junior Faculty: The Minority Imperative

描述（由申请人提供）：尽管非洲裔美国人的艾滋病毒感染率急剧上升，但美国很少有非洲裔美国人从事艾滋病毒临床研究。非洲裔美国人研究人员的缺乏可能阻碍了在这一人群中防治这一流行病的有效措施的制定。这项建议的指导目标是增加从事艾滋病毒相关的面向病人的研究的研究人员，特别是非洲裔美国人的研究人员。该提案概述了一项计划，以招募和提供培训和支持，以指导他们推进研究独立。这项提案的研究目标是审查几个关键因素，促进和维持艾滋病毒的持续传播和种族差异的艾滋病毒相关的发病率和死亡率在非洲裔美国人。这项拟议中的研究将检查：1）与异性性传播艾滋病毒感染的非裔美国人中晚期诊断相关的因素，2）病毒学治疗失败与社区贫困和公共处方药保险的关系。这些研究将建立在我以前关于异性传播艾滋病毒感染的流行病学和社会经济背景因素在非裔美国人中人口艾滋病毒传播的重要性的研究基础上。通过拟议的研究，并与卫生政策和管理学院的工作，我建议扩展我的研究技能，包括健康结果和卫生政策。这些研究将为制定未来个人和社区一级的结构性干预措施提供经验数据，以减少非裔美国人中的艾滋病毒传播，并降低艾滋病毒阳性的非裔美国人和南部及全国其他地区的发病率和死亡率。

DESCRIPTION (provided by applicant): Despite dramatically escalating HIV rates among African Americans, few African Americans in the US engage in HIV clinical research. The dearth of African American researchers has likely hindered development of effective measures to combat the epidemic in this population. The mentoring goal of this proposal is to increase the pool of researchers - especially African American investigators - who conduct HIV-related patient oriented research. The proposal outlines a plan to recruit and provide training and support to mentees as they advance to research independence. The research goals of this proposal are to examine several key factors that foster and maintain continued HIV transmission and racial disparities in HIV-related morbidity and mortality among African Americans. The proposed research will examine: 1) factors associated with late diagnosis among African Americans with heterosexually transmitted HIV infection and 2) virologic treatment failure's relationship to neighborhood- level poverty and public prescription drug insurance. The studies will build on my previous research concerning the epidemiology of heterosexually transmitted HIV infection and the importance of socioeconomic contextual factors in population HIV transmission among African Americans. Through the proposed studies and work with UNC Health Policy and Administration faculty, I propose to extend my research skills to include health outcomes and health policy. These studies will provide empiric data for development of future individual-level and community-level structural interventions to decrease HIV transmission among African Americans and decrease morbidity and mortality among HIV+ African Americans and others in the South and the rest of the nation.