Texas Center for Minority Health, Education, Research and Outreach

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Project Summary-Overall Despite the overall improvement in the health of Americans during the past three decades, significant disparities in health outcomes persist based on race and ethnicity, sex, level of education and income, and other social characteristics. There is a growing awareness in many segments of United States society that persistent health disparities are not acceptable, and that through coordinated and targeted actions most health disparities are correctable. Created in 2005 with funding as an EXPORT Center, and current funding as a NIMHD Center of Excellence (P20), the Texas Center for Health Disparities (TCHD) has been a leader in health disparities research, education, and outreach in its local community, throughout the State of Texas, and in many parts of the nation. Building on its significant experience and expansive relationships, the TCHD proposes the NIMHD Specialized Center of Excellence (COE) with a focus on Women’s Health Disparities. Consistent with the community-based participatory research (CBPR) focus of the TCHD, the focus area was identified through substantial community dialogue with partners. We will employ translational and CBPR approaches for identifying developing detection and therapeutic strategies for triple negative breast cancer, testing a patient- centered, community pharmacy-based comprehensive medication therapy management for HIV patients and an intervention to improve health behavior among women in underserved communities. Our COE will augment and strengthen the existing infrastructure and capacity of the TCHD for conducting basic, clinical, translational, participatory, and socio-behavioral research consistent with the NIMHD Research Framework. Our focus on Women’s Health Disparities will address a significant need among racial and ethnic minority women in the U.S., the State of Texas, and our local community. We will also expand and develop new education and community engagement activities with our partner institutions and community. The objectives of our COE are to: 1) Conduct CBPR based- and biomedical- research on health disparities in women’s health that exists in Texas minorities such as cancer, HIV, obesity, cardiovascular diseases, and stroke, 2) Provide opportunities for junior faculty, postdocs and early stage investigators to train in health disparity research that meets the community needs, 3) Promote education of students in health professions, health care practitioners and policy makers on the existence of health disparities and the need to combat the problem, and 4) Serve as a resource for the minority communities in North Texas to disseminate health information, promote community participation in health education and research, and to implement disease prevention activities.