Core E: Outreach, Recruitment and Education Core

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ABSTRACT: OUTREACH AND RECRUITMENT (OR) CORE The OR Core connects the public, healthcare professionals, trainees, and investigators to facilitate aging and AD research, positioning the KU ADC as a critical community asset for the region. In the last 5 years, we have established a dynamic infrastructure to communicate scientific and health information to our stakeholders and incorporate their needs and requests into our programs. Our goal is to support innovative avenues of research, train investigators and health care professionals, and reach more people with the latest information on dementia and aging. We will accomplish this by providing specialized education on dementia and brain aging, supporting recruitment into studies, and facilitating use of technology in education and research. Our education of lay public and healthcare professionals has been far-reaching. We have provided over 1200 hours of continuing education to professionals throughout the Central Plains, established an internship program that has enabled research opportunties for trainees, and provided dementia and brain aging education to more than 6000 community memmbers. The OR Core has successfully assisted with recruitment for 21 trials (over 800 enrollments). Recognizing emerging needs for prevention trials we have worked with the Clinical Core to create alternative pools of potential subjects: the Affiliated Cohort and Eligibility Database. Over the next cycle, the OR Core will focus on enhancing these participant pools with greater diversity through our outreach efforts. The use of mobile health (mHealth) technologies such as mobile phones, tablet computers and internet- connected activity monitors hold promise for revolutionizing science and health care. The KU ADC currently supports several projects testing the feasibility and efficacy of these mHealth technologies for improved research and care. Because of the great potential for personalized education and feedback, the OR Core has assumed the primary responsibility for supporting mHealth technology. The OR Core will continue to promote and support the use of mHealth technologies in clinical and research settings. Through its efforts and programs, the OR Core has established the KU ADC as a regional leader in brain aging scholarship and education. The OR Core is well positioned to build on the achievements of the previous cycle by supporting innovative avenues of research, training investigators and health care professionals, and reaching more people with the latest information on dementia and aging.