Interdisciplinary Research Training on Health and Aging

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Project Summary/Abstract The proposed program, “Interdisciplinary Research Training in Public Health and Aging” seeks a five-year continuation of the current award, which was funded originally in 2008, and renewed in April 2014. The program will focus specifically on training opportunities in the social and behavioral determinants of adverse health outcomes in older age, and their mediation through or interaction with the biological mechanisms that are commonly thought to be associated with aging-related changes in health. The rational for this focus lies in the potential of this research to identify new opportunities for the prevention, management and treatment of aging-related chronic health conditions and their functional consequences. The program defines its disciplinary foundation in social epidemiology, while emphasizing collaboration with scholarly activity from other disciplinary perspectives, including other public health sciences, social sciences, biological sciences and medical sciences. This application requests funds to support and train a total of 8 pre-doctoral trainees, with 2 new trainees being recruited each of the first 4 years of the program. The program will be located in the Department of Epidemiology of the University of Michigan School of Public Health. The Department of Epidemiology provides an exceptionally rich intellectual environment for an inter-disciplinary training program in public health and aging, due to the interconnections of its faculty with a large number of Research Institutes and Centers at the University of Michigan. The training program includes 15 mentors with well-established research and training records encompassing a variety of disciplinary backgrounds. The training program consists of a structured program of teaching and mentoring with the following inter-related components: 1) mentored research activity; 2) course work in the epidemiology of aging and related subject matters, and participation in public health and aging research seminars; and 3) participation in other training and enrichment opportunities available at the University of Michigan.