OMH AI/AN Health Disparities Program Grant Summary Overview
There are four objectives that this grant aims to achieve. These are: 1) Increase the quality and availability of research, evaluation, and surveillance data including those in electronic formats; 2) To create career pathways in public health practice and prevention oriented research for tribal members; 3) To provide training to leadership at all levels in the areas of cultural competency and issues specific to AI/AN health disparities; and 4) To disseminate information and results that are obtained.
The first objective will be met by working in partnership with the Oklahoma State Department of Health (OSDH) Chronic Disease, Acute Disease, and HIV/STD Divisions and the Indian Health Service - Oklahoma City Area Office (IHS-OCAO) on two disease reporting enhancement projects. The aim of this collaborative is to enhance the reporting of reportable diseases as well as cancer.
Our partner for the second objective is the University of Oklahoma, College of Public Health. This objective will be met by recruiting and encouraging Native American students to enter the public health field, especially epidemiology and biostatistics. It will be up to the SPIEC to actively recruit students, help them to apply to the OU College of Public Health (CoPH), help with finding funding for tuition, fees, and room and board. A steering committee consisting of faculty from the Biostatistics and Epidemiology (BSE) Department of the OU CoPH, Oklahoma State Department of Health personnel, and IHS - OCAO has been formed to help select a student for an internship or Graduate Research Assistantship with SPIEC. While a Native American student is preferred, a non-Native student with interest in Native issues may be selected due to the small number of Native American students in the BSE Department. Internship Opportunity
This third objective also involves partners from OU-CoPH and OSDH and in addition, the National Indian Women's Health Resource Center. The Training and Intervention Coordinator for SPIEC, in conjunction with NIWHC will be conducting focus groups at the CoPH and the OSDH as well as with tribes across Oklahoma. The results of these focus groups will be used to develop a cultural awareness curriculum. This curriculum will then be used to provide cultural awareness training for faculty and staff at both the CoPH and the OSDH.
The fourth objective consists of disseminating information. Under this objective, SPIEC will disseminate information via trainings, presentations, publications, journals, conferences and other meetings. Disseminations of reports on all database linkage findings (communicable disease and cancer) to Oklahoma, Kansas, and Texas I/T/U's (no identification of facilities will be made public). The SPIEC staff and partners will develop articles for publication in professional/peer reviewed journals. All information will be submitted for approval to IHS and Tribal Institutional Review Boards (IRB) prior to submission to any journals. This may be one or more papers and may include findings from all projects.
Information regarding the methodology and logistics of the SPIEC AI/AN Health Disparities Program (including information about the TEC Internship program) will be presented at National Conferences (APHA, IHS Research Conference, Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, etc).
Dissemination of cultural awareness training will occur via the web. It may also be available to private health entities that work with AI/AN people. At the end of the five year program period, a seminar highlighting the I/T/U health facilities that have developed this training will be held so experiences can be shared and documented.