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Resarch to Eliminate Health Disparities
Research that documents racial and ethnic health disparities can play a key role in understanding and eliminating such disparities. The publication of such research findings and the collaboration with faculty at outside the institution can also be effective in disseminating new knowledge and leveraging it to balance the deficit in heath disparities. The following objectives in bold are extractions from the ASPH Health Disparities Report, followed by a brief synopsis and examples of each as they are applicable to schools of public health.
Encourage collaborations that equitably involve multiple principal investigators from communities with racial and ethnic health disparities in the development, implementation, and evaluation of CBPR focused on racial and ethnic health disparities.
Communities are often the locales for, and subjects of, public health research, but are less frequently sought or included as equal partners in the conceptualization, development, and implementation of these research projects. However, the faculty-community relationship can be mutually beneficial, with each party benefiting from the other’s expertise.
One example of a successful faculty-community partnership is the African American Health Initiative (AAHI) of San Bernardino County, California. AAHI is a collaborative of various community stakeholders, including Loma Linda University School of Public Health, a member since the inception of AAHI in 1999. Faculty members from several SPH departments have taken leadership roles in developing the initiative, working in concert with community stakeholders on numerous special projects, including grant writing, data collection and analysis, preparation of scientific reports and papers, and presentation of findings to the local community and to attendees at state and national professional conferences. Community participants were identified through church ministerial groups, black fraternities, health care providers, and the Masons and Elk Lodges. The empowerment efforts of faculty have increased the skills of black community members to negotiate and participate in health decision-making, present their concerns to local and state policy-makers, be proactive in personal health choices, and take leadership roles in improving the health of their communities. Several black leaders have emerged to create grassroots organizations and work together to establish a nonprofit organization that will provide focused preventive health services for blacks. Partnerships have developed between AAHI initiative representatives and the Black Medical Society to create a systems approach to decreasing health disparities. In addition, Loma Linda University School of Public Health students have cultivated a trusting relationship with the black community, and many student-led mini-projects have been initiated.
When Loma Linda University received another community-wide grant, faculty members contacted participants from their previous work, who were eager to be involved. ASPH, with support from the U.S. Health Resources and Services Administration, awarded the 2005 Student Award for Excellence in Public Health Practice to a doctoral student for leading this AAHI county-wide health planning research project. In addition, this initiative is becoming an institute and changing the health delivery system in the county. Moreover, a Loma Linda faculty member is working with a Morehouse University faculty member to replicate this type of work in Atlanta.
Furthermore, another opportunity for public health schools and programs to participate in such research activities is through the National Center on Minority Health and Health Disparities (NCMHD) Project EXPORT (for centers of excellence in partnerships for community outreach, health disparities research, and training). The Minority Health and Health Disparities Research and Education Act of 2000 authorized the NCMHD to establish centers of excellence. The first NCMHD centers of excellence were partnerships for community outreach, research on health disparities, and training. First established in 2002, these centers have since become known as NCMHD Project EXPORT centers. This centers of excellence program will support research on the multiple and complex factors contributing to minority health and health disparities. SPHs with EXPORT grants include the University of Pittsburgh Graduate School of Public Health, University of Arizona Mel and Enid Zuckerman College of Public Health, and University of Medicine and Dentistry of New Jersey.
Encourage and facilitate racial and ethnic health disparities research collaborations among faculty at minority-serving institutions and majority institutions.
The ASPH and CDC collaborated on the Trans-Association Partnership Project (TAPP), a unique set of CDC planning grants that paired CEPH-accredited SPHs with HBCUs that offer graduate degrees in public health. In an effort to address the nation’s ongoing problem of racial and ethnic health disparities, the planning grants created partnerships to establish culturally diverse and state-of-the-science research environments within the institutions. TAPP goals were as follows:
- Facilitate prevention research through multi-institutional collaboration to eliminate health disparities
- Build partnering relationships across institutions
- Foster the research infrastructure at member institutions
There were six TAPP grantees with faculty from CEPH accredited schools. Each planning grant proposal identified two principal investigators (PIs), one from an HBCU and one from an accredited SPH. Planning grant funds were awarded to the two collaborating institutions, thus creating partnerships that encouraged the institutions to rely on their complementary strengths. The partners collaborated on the development of a joint research proposal targeted at eliminating health disparities. At the end of each proposal development period, full proposal funding was sought to continue the joint projects. Two of the six projects initially received funding awards for the planning grant phase and, following the development of full proposals, obtained full funding the subsequent year; the remaining four projects received funding awards at the planning grant level.
Overall, the TAPP PIs concluded that the partnerships were positive. They cultivated ongoing working relationships among themselves and other researchers and students from their respective institutions, and they also developed new faculty and student mentoring relationships, sharpened research skills, and reinvigorated different approaches to problem-solving in health disparities research. The accredited SPHs gained valuable faculty and student training opportunities, lessons on cultural competence, and insights on the need for diverse perspectives to better address issues of health disparities. The HBCUs enhanced research capacity by using the advanced research facilities and robust staffing of partner SPHs, and some HBCU programs developed new relationships with the CDC. Some of the challenges experienced by TAPP PIs included insufficient funding, lack of needed time, limited face-to-face interactions because of physical distance, and complex paperwork.
Encourage peer-reviewed publications to publish CBPR focusing on the elimination of racial and ethnic health disparities.
The CBPR research methodology can be very useful in determining reasons for, and ways to address, racial and ethnic health disparities. However, CBPR might not be well understood by university leaders and faculty member peers, or may not be valued as much as other research methods, and thus is less likely to be published in respected peer-reviewed journals, distracting from its credibility. When CBPR findings are not published, it deters faculty from using CBPR methods
A new journal has been added to the peer-reviewed publications catalog that focuses on publishing CBPR. The Johns Hopkins Urban Health Institute, in conjunction with the W.K. Kellogg Foundation, launched a national peer-reviewed journal dedicated to community health partnerships. Progress in Community Health Partnerships: Research, Education, and Action addresses topics focusing on the growing CBPR field while promoting further collaboration and elevating the visibility and stature of CBPR as a tool for eliminating health disparities.
The mission of this journal is to facilitate the dissemination of programs that use community partnerships to improve public health, to promote progress in the methods of research and education involving community health partnerships, and to stimulate action that will improve the health of people in communities. As defined by the journal, communities can be based on geography, shared interests, or social networks. The journal is dedicated to supporting the work of community health partnerships that involve ongoing collaboration among community representatives and academic or governmental partners.
Although the formation of this new journal constitutes a positive step, work is still needed to encourage additional opportunities for faculty to publish on CBPR in public health settings. It has been advised in the Faculty page of this website that Schools of Public Health start incorporating community-engagement initiatives, like CBPR, into their Tenure and Promotion guidelines.
Funding Opportunities
Funding Guides and Websites
Funding by University
External Funding
Funding Guides and Websites
- The Office of Minority Health Resource Center (OMHRC) has made a FUNDING GUIDE available. This guide contains information that individuals and organizations can use to begin their research on funding opportunities. It includes resources to enhance one's knowledge of funding sources, announcements, and technical assistance. To get a copy call 1-800-444-6472 or e-mail: info@omhrc.gov.
- Minority Investigator Website Members of the Working Group on Health Disparities: The NIH's Office of Behavioral and Social Sciences Research (OBSSR) recently launched a web page designed to foster mentoring relationships between junior minority investigators and NIH grantees in the behavioral and social sciences. The web page fosters these relationships by facilitating the use of the NIH Research Supplements for Underrepresented Minorities program. It is anticipated that the site will be an important bridge that links minority students and junior investigators with NIH-funded behavioral and social scientists: http://mentorminorities.od.nih.gov/.
- The 100 Minority Scholarship Gateway List provides links to over 100 different scholarships and grants.
Funding by University
Harvard School of Public Health
University at Albany SUNY School of Public Health
Mel and Enid Zuckerman Arizona College of Public Health
University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill
External Funding
- Aetna Foundation Community Grants Program - Reducing Health Disparities: Aetna Foundation Regional Community Grants Program is soliciting applications that seek to reduce health disparities in communities where its employees and customers work and live. Proposals should specifically address expanding the reach of cultural competency/cross-cultural education such that health care professionals can work with diverse patient populations and deliver culturally and linguistically competent care. Or, proposals should address community-based programs aimed at improving access to care for racial and ethnic minorities.
- Agency for Healthcare Research and Quality (AHRQ)'s Minority Health Program
- Center for Disease Control Funding Website – The CDC offers a variety of fellowships and grants for students and researchers alike.
- Congressional Black Caucus Health Braintrust Louis Stokes Urban Health Policy Fellows Program (CBC-LSUHPFP): The program provides an outstanding opportunity for aspiring healthcare professionals and behavioral and social scientists with an interest in minority health policy processes at the congressional level to gain first hand experience in policy development. Fellows actively contribute to the formulation of national health policies while accelerating their careers as leaders in health policy.
- The Congressional Hispanic Caucus Institute (CHCI) offers Latinos from across the country the opportunity to gain hands-on experience at the policy level in Washington, DC. CHCI offers a variety of Scholarship and Fellowship opportunities for Latino students.
- NIH Research Training Opportunities for Minorities
- The Wellstone Fellowship for Social Justice: the fellowship is designed to foster the advancement of social justice through participation in health care advocacy work that focuses on the unique challenges facing many communities of color. The goals of the Wellstone Fellowship Program are three-fold: (1) To address disparities in access to health care; (2) To inspire Wellstone Fellows to continue to work for social justice throughout their lives; and (3) To increase the number and racial and ethnic diversity of up-and-coming social justice advocates and leaders.
- Nonprofit Academic Centers Council (NACC) offers the David Stevenson Fellowship awarded to junior faculty members of color in tenure track positions; and the William Diaz Faculty Fellowship is offered to faculty members of color of any rank whose work focuses on philanthropy, nonprofits, and diversity.
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