Our CCTS team comprises many expert investigators who are working hard to move the needle on health disparities, a major focus of the CCTS mission. Join us in congratulating Drs. Mona Fouad, Kenneth Saag, and Isabel Scarinci, whose efforts to reduce disparities in obesity, gout, and cancer have recently received media attention and, in some cases, major funding awards. 

CCTS Director of Special Populations Mona Fouad, MD, MPH (Director, UAB Preventive Medicine) has been awarded a $7 million grant from the NIH to establish the UAB Obesity Health Disparities Research Center. The new center will support transdisciplinary, multi-level, multi-domain research on obesity-related health disparities to understand the complex contributors to obesity and how they vary at critical periods across the life course, with an ultimate goal of reducing and eliminating disparities in obesity between African Americans and whites. 

Full story: http://www.uab.edu/medicine/dom/news-events/good-news/535-residents-deliver-fresh-food-to-east-lake-community

CCTS Director of Mentored Career Development and Predoctoral Training Programs Dr. Kenneth Saag, MD, MSc, (Director, UAB InvestigationS in Gout, Hyperuricemia and ComorbidiTies (INSIGHT) Center of Research Translation and Lowe Professor of Medicine) has been awarded a $6.5 million grant to conduct innovative translational multisite research projects spanning the basic and pre-clinical spectrum from genetic and molecular underpinnings of hyperuricemia and gout to better understand how urate-lowering therapies for gout might preserve kidney function in gout patients. African Americans are more likely to suffer from gout and are less likely to receive optimal treatment for it. By honing in on novel biomarkers for gout flares and genetic predictors for responsivity to gout therapies, the four INSIGHT projects seek to deliver on the promise of precision medicine. 

Full story: http://www.uab.edu/news/innovation/item/8775-translational-researchers-at-uab-received-a-6-5-million-grant-to-further-investigate-gout-and-associated-diseases

UAB Magazine recently recognized CCTS Special Populations expert Dr. Isabel Scarinci, MPH, PhD, (Associate Director for Globalization and Cancer Disparities, Comprehensive Cancer Center and Professor, UAB Preventive Medicine) for her efforts to reduce disparities in cancer among low-income racial and ethnic minorities. A UAB School of Public Health alum and psychologist by training, Scarinci’s behavioral research has led to the creation of several successful community-based, culturally relevant programs for Latina immigrants in Alabama and tobacco cessation programs in Brazil. She also helped establish the first mentoring program for Latino students at UAB and serves as Brazil’s honorary consul in Alabama. 

Full story: http://www.uab.edu/uabmagazine/features/fighting-cancer-fighting-inequality