SEPTEMBER 2001

MEDICAL COLLEGE'S RESEARCH STARTS WITH HEALTH EQUITY

Florida State's College of Medicine opened its first research center, the Center for Health Equity, in late June, bringing the issue of health disparity to the forefront of the new medical school.
The center's purpose is closely related to the medical school's mission of bringing better medical care to Florida's most vulnerable populations. The research center will focus on reducing the disparity in health outcomes between racial and ethnic groups.

It opened with a $3-million grant from the federal Health Resources and Services Adminis-tration. The four-year grant project will work to improve the health of people who live in Gadsden County, where the health statistics are among the dreariest in the state.

The purpose is to find ways to make sure that African American people in Gadsden County, especially mothers and babies, are as healthy as those who are white. 
There's a long way to go. The mortality rate for white babies in Gadsden County is 1.5 per 1,000. For African American babies, it's 9.5 per 1,000.

The new center was founded by a multidisciplinary team with expertise in medicine, research, evaluation, community development and public health. The center partners, Dr. Isabel Stabile, Maurine Jones, Linda Contreras, Ayakao Watkins and Cheryl Robbins, have a long history of working to empower diverse groups in vulnerable communities. 

"The fact that babies die (in Gadsden County) is not (just) a medical problem," said Stabile, an obstetrician and gynecologist who is the center's medical director. "It's not entirely because there wasn't a respirator to keep them alive. They die because of social determinants like lack of education, lack of transportation."

She said officials at FSU's new medical school were very interested as soon as they heard about the role they could play with the Center for Health Equity.

"They said it fits their mission perfectly," she recalled.
"This medical school is going to do things a little differently," she said, citing, as an example, the college's efforts to recruit a diverse student body.

And the center's partners hope to help Gadsden County do things a little differently.

Jones, who has a doctorate from Florida State in program evaluation and measurement and 18 years of experience in organizing public health programs, is a cofounder and director of program development and evaluation at the center.

Jones notes the disparity in health outcomes across different racial and ethnic groups for diabetes, cardiovascular disease, cancer, AIDS and other diseases.

She says the inequity is rooted in more than unequal access to good health care. She also cites social factors.
To overcome those problems, the center has begun by involving residents of Gadsden County (almost 60 percent are African-American or Hispanic) in planning the center's project.

"They know what their problems are, and they know what will work and what won't," Jones said. "The thing they need from us is the technical assistance to put the basic framework in place."

She said the center will work with the community to manage and evaluate the programs.

The new project will provide staff to coordinate the health care of those who are at risk.

The mission of the center is "comprehensive and statewide," Jones said, and it will combine:

· research into the causes of health disparities,
· training and concrete assistance to community organizations working to eliminate disparities in health and
· hands-on experience for medical students with community issues that affect disparities. 

   The result, the founders hope, will be healthier, more self-sufficient and effective communities in Florida. -Brad Parsons

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