Mayo Clinic Office of Health Disparities Research announces 2017 pilot project awards

The Mayo Clinic Office of Health Disparities Research announced 2017 pilot project awards to investigators to develop interests in health disparities and add consideration of health disparities to ongoing research efforts. Award funds are intended to identify, reduce and eliminate health disparities.

Mayo Clinic Office of Health Disparities Research award recipients

Mira Keddis, M.D. (I ’09, CMR ’10, NEPH ’13), consultant, Nephrology, Arizona: A Pilot Study on the Barriers to Kidney Transplantation and Kidney Transplant Outcomes in American Indians

“We propose performing a pilot study of the American Indian population who presented to Mayo Clinic Arizona for kidney transplant evaluation to examine pre-transplant factors that influence the transplant evaluation process, time to wait listing and time to transplantation and post-transplant outcomes. In the absence of this information, the promise of providing equitable and effective transplant care will likely not be fully realized.”

Aaron Mangold, M.D. (TY ’12, DERM ’15), senior associate consultant, Dermatology, Arizona: Perception and Reality – The Characterization of Skin Lesions, Attitudes Toward Malignancy and Body Awareness in Hispanics

“We propose a pilot study that will focus on the underserved Hispanic population to characterize benign and malignant neoplasms, assess perceived melanoma risk, assess self-body awareness and rates of self-skin examination, correlate the distribution of benign pigmented lesions with SEER data on melanoma and create targeted educational interventions.”

James Meschia, M.D. (N ’97), consultant, Neurology, Florida: Increasing Diversity and Genotyping of Non-European Descent Individuals in the Mayo Clinic Florida Familial Cerebrovascular Diseases Registry

“Our goal is to perform exome sequencing in early-onset African American patients with a cerebrovascular phenotype to allow us to examine the role of known genes (from the Caucasian population) and potentially identify novel genes and assess their impact across races.”

Jane Njeru, M.B., Ch.B. (I ’12, PCIR ’13), senior associate consultant, Primary Care/Internal Medicine, Rochester: Social Network Analysis for Health Behaviors Among Hispanic and Somali Adults at Risk for Cardiovascular Disease

“The aims of this proposal are to conduct a social network analysis to identify community peer interventionists and assess existing social structures that contribute to health behaviors among Hispanic and Somali adults at risk for cardiovascular disease. This will inform the development of a sustainable, peer-delivered social network intervention to improve dietary behaviors in these populations.”

Carmen Radecki Breitkopf, Ph.D. (HSR ’10), senior associate consultant II, Health Sciences Research, Rochester: Exploring Attitudes Toward Return of Genetic Research Results to Family Among Diverse Populations

“The goal of this research is to collect qualitative data from diverse groups of individuals with respect to family member preference about receiving genomic research results, particularly after death of the participant.”