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January 11, 2001

GSPH gets grant to study racial, ethnic differences in adult health service use

Pitt has received a $1.27 million federal grant to study racial and ethnic differences in health status and the use of health services among adults.

The grant is one of nine awarded by the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services' Agency for Healthcare Research and Quality (AHRQ) to address ethnic and racial health disparities. The grant establishes Pitt as a Center for Excellence in Minority Health Research.

"We are very excited about this grant, which will jump-start the research program in our Center for Minority Health," said Edmund Ricci, chairperson of the Department of Health Services Administration in Pitt's Graduate School of Public Health (GSPH) and principal investigator on the project.

"The research funded through the AHRQ grant will yield tremendous benefits in terms of the prevention, diagnosis and treatment of diseases and disabilities that affect minority adult populations in unnecessarily large numbers," said Stephen B. Thomas, director of the Center for Minority Health and co-principal investigator.

Pitt's program involves GSPH and the schools of medicine and social work. Each of the program's four projects will involve a minority person as principal investigator or co-principal investigator, and each of the program's three administrative cores will have a minority director or co-director. Researchers will mentor minority health care students involved in the four projects. Community members will be involved at every level, beginning with the development of research questions. Community members also will review drafts of findings and conclusions and have the chance to offer their own interpretations of the findings.

The projects address four of the six priority areas outlined in Healthy People 2010, the National Institutes of Health's directive for improving the public health of all Americans by the year 2010. Their titles are "Elimination of Disparities in Adult Immunization Status," "Patient Provider Communication Regarding Cancer Screening," "An Intervention/Evaluation Study to Control Lipid Disorders and Hypertension in African-American Males" and "Using Oral Histories to Improve Patient Provider Interactions."

 

Filed under: Feature,Volume 33 Issue 9

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