The African-American Health Improvement Partnership

描述(申请人提供)：这个为期三年的项目结合了规划活动和试点干预研究，以开发可复制的干预措施，以改善北卡罗来纳州达勒姆工薪阶层和中产阶级非裔美国人的健康。基于已发表的(尽管有限的)关于当地健康差距的数据，以及研究小组以前的经验，该项目可能会专注于非裔美国成年人的2型糖尿病和高血压的管理。这些干预措施很可能还将强调在社会阶层内部和跨社会阶层发展社会支持，以此作为实现健康可持续改善的工具。然而，根据以社区为基础的参与性研究(CBPR)的原则，疾病焦点的确定以及干预设计和战略将通过社区参与性研究规划过程进行。该项目有五个阶段：1)为社区咨询委员会(CAB)建立操作规范和议程，以促进CAB和项目团队基于知情、有效和协作共识的决策；2)评估社区需求、资产、健康优先事项和现有的健康倡议；并制定一项实施和测试干预措施的计划，以创造非裔美国成年人健康的可持续变化，以及社区一级和影响其健康的卫生系统因素；3)实施试点干预研究；4)向达勒姆社区传播研究结果，并制定和提交一份全面干预研究计划；5)向更大的卫生服务社区传播研究结果。相关性：这些文献记录了美国白人和非裔美国人的健康状况和医疗保健之间的显著差异。拟议的项目将有助于我们了解差距以及如何通过两种方式减少差距。首先，尽管中产阶级中存在种族差异，但大多数干预措施和大多数CBPR项目都侧重于工薪阶层的非裔美国人。其次，该项目将制定干预措施，解决医疗保健系统内外的社会因素，这些因素似乎导致非裔美国人人口的健康状况不佳。

DESCRIPTION (provided by applicant): This three-year project combines planning activities and pilot intervention research to develop replicable interventions to improve the health of working and middle class African-Americans in Durham, North Carolina. Based on published (albeit limited) data on local health disparities, and on the prior experiences of the research team, the project will likely focus on the management of type 2 diabetes and hypertension in African American adults. It is likely that the interventions will also emphasize developing social supports within and across social class lines as a vehicle to achieve sustainable improvements in health. In keeping with the principles of community-based participatory research (CBPR), however, the determination of disease focus, as well as the intervention design and strategy, will be made through a CBPR planning process. The project has five stages: 1) Establish operating norms and an agenda for the Community Advisory Board (CAB) that will promote informed, effective, and collaborative consensus-based decision-making by the CAB and project team; 2) Assess community needs, assets, health priorities, and existing health initiatives; and develop a plan to implement and test an intervention to create sustainable changes in the health of African-American adults, and in community-level and health system factors impacting their health; 3) Implement pilot intervention research; 4) Disseminate findings to the Durham community, and develop and submit a full intervention research plan; 5) Disseminate findings to the larger health services community. Relevance: The literature documents significant disparities between the health status and health care of White Americans and African-Americans. The proposed project will contribute to our knowledge of disparities and how to reduce them in two ways. First, despite the fact that racial disparities exist within the middle class, most interventions and most CBPR projects have focused on working-class African-Americans. Second, the project will develop interventions that address social factors within and outside the health care system that appear to contribute to health disadvantages in the African American population.