The AAMC and The Patrick and Catherine Weldon Donaghue Medical Research Foundation announced the recipients of the 2015 funding opportunity Advancing Implementation Science in Community/Academic Partnered Research. The grant was offered in partnership with the AHEAD Initiative, which seeks to identify, evaluate, and disseminate effective and replicable AAMC-member practices that improve community health and reduce health inequities.
Researchers were asked to develop proposals highlighting the collaboration between academic health centers and community partners focused on prioritized needs identified through the medical center's Community Health Needs Assessment (CHNA). The following two projects were selected:
Community Academic Partnerships to Improve Birth Outcomes
Principal Investigator: Wendy Gwirtzman Lane, M.D., M.P.H., University of Maryland School of Medicine
To address poor birth outcomes among inner-city African-American women, Dr. Lane and her team propose expanding B’more for Healthy Babies community outreach services and programming to the Mondawmin Neighborhood of West Baltimore. The research team will partner with the Baltimore City Health Department and the Family League of Baltimore City to conduct a needs assessment and implement services in a manner that best reaches community members and best meets their needs. The program will be integrated into multiple aspects of undergraduate and graduate medical training, as well as training in other professional schools and programs. The collaborative team will conduct a multipronged, multilevel evaluation of the intervention: 1) at a population level through public health data, 2) at a community level through focus groups, 3) at the individual level through measurement of changes in risk and protective factors, and 4) at the training level through participant surveys. They hypothesize that the intervention will lead to earlier entry into prenatal care, improvements in maternal health during pregnancy, a reduction in preterm births, a reduction in NICU hospitalizations, and a decrease in newborn hospital costs.
Partnering to Support Healthy Moms and Babies in Baltimore and Beyond: Celebrating 10 Years of B’More for Healthy Babies
October 7, 14, 21, & 28, 2020 -- This virtual event series reviewed the success of B’more for Healthy Babies, outlined the goals for the program moving forward, and gathered strategies and enhanced momentum for building organizational capacity to implement community-based research to improve maternal and child health outcomes.
Reducing the Lung Cancer Burden in Northeast Kentucky through an Academic/Community Partnership: A Terminate Lung Cancer (TLC) Study
Principal Investigator: Roberto Cardarelli, D.O., M.P.H., University of Kentucky College of Medicine
In partnership with St. Claire Regional Medical Center (SCRMC), Dr. Cardarelli and his team will implement an educational curriculum aimed at reducing lung cancer rates through early screening and tobacco cessation in the rural region served by SCRMC. Professionals who serve the population will participate in a series of educational opportunities intended to create change in knowledge and attitudes toward lung cancer screening and tobacco cessation guidelines. In addition, 5 clinics will participate in a tailored implementation approach to increase screening and tobacco cessation counseling. The study will evaluate experiences and uptake of the education program and implement and monitor the processes and workflows undertaken by the clinics. The research team anticipates an approximate 40% shift from late-stage diagnosed lung cancers (Stage III/IV) to earlier stages (Stage I/II) based on the screening intervention efforts. Measured drivers for these histologic outcomes will be rates of LDCT screening and orders for smoking cessation counseling at the clinic-level.