Faculty Bibliography

BACKGROUND:Blood pressure (BP) control is suboptimal in minority communities, including Asian populations. We evaluate the feasibility, adoption, and effectiveness of an integrated CHW-led health coaching and practice-level intervention to improve hypertension control among South Asian patients in New York City, Project IMPACT (Integrating Million Hearts for Provider and Community Transformation). The primary outcome was BP control, and secondary outcomes were systolic BP and diastolic BP at 6-month follow-up. METHODS:A randomized-controlled trial took place within community-based primary care practices that primarily serve South Asian patients in New York City between 2017 and 2019. A total of 303 South Asian patients aged 18-85 with diagnosed hypertension and uncontrolled BP (systolic BP ≥140 mm Hg or diastolic BP ≥90 mm Hg) within the previous 6 months at 14 clinic sites consented to participate. After completing 1 education session, individuals were randomized into treatment (n=159) or control (n=144) groups. Treatment participants received 4 additional group education sessions and individualized health coaching over a 6-month period. A mixed effect generalized linear model with a logit link function was used to assess intervention effectiveness for controlled hypertension (Yes/No), adjusting for practice level random effect, age, sex, baseline systolic BP, and days between BP measurements. RESULTS:<0.001). In final adjusted analysis, treatment group participants had 3.7 [95% CI, 2.1-6.5] times the odds of achieving BP control at follow-up compared with the control group. CONCLUSIONS:A CHW-led health coaching intervention was effective in achieving BP control among South Asian Americans in New York City primary care practices. Findings can guide translation and dissemination of this model across other communities experiencing hypertension disparities. REGISTRATION/BACKGROUND:URL: https://www. CLINICALTRIALS/RESULTS:gov; Unique identifier: NCT03159533.

PURPOSE/OBJECTIVE:Although there is national recognition for health equity-oriented research, there is limited guidance for researchers to engage partnerships that promote health equity in cancer research. The Cancer Prevention and Control Research Network's (CPCRN) Health Equity Work Group developed a toolkit to guide researchers in equitable collaborations. METHODS:The CPCRN's Health Equity Work Group collectively outlined health and racial equity principles guiding research collaborations with partners that include communities, community-based organizations, implementing partners in the clinical setting including providers and health care organizations, and policy makers. Using a network-wide survey to crowdsource information around ongoing practices, we leveraged and integrated the network's experience and collaborations. RESULTS:Data from the survey formed the preliminary basis for the toolkit, with a focus on sharing fiscal resources with partners, training and capacity building, collaborative decision-making, community-driven research agenda setting, and sustainability. The final toolkit provides reflection considerations for researchers and collated exemplary resources, supported by the contemporary research. CONCLUSIONS:The toolkit provides a guide to researchers at all experience levels wanting to engage in equitable research collaborations. Future efforts are underway to evaluate whether and how researchers within and outside CPCRN are able to incorporate these principles in research collaborations.

Introduction: Immigration has been identified as an important social determinant of health (SDH), embodying structures and policies that reinforce positions of poverty, stress, and limited social and economic mobility. In the public health literature with regard to diet, immigration is often characterized as an individual-level process (dietary acculturation) and is largely examined in one racial/ethnic subgroup at a time. For this narrative review, we aim to broaden the research discussion by describing SDH common to the immigrant experience and that may serve as barriers to healthy diets. Methods: A narrative review of peer-reviewed quantitative, qualitative, and mixed methods studies on cardiometabolic health disparities, diet, and immigration was conducted. Results: Cardiometabolic disease disparities were frequently described by racial/ethnic subgroups instead of country of origin. While cardiovascular disease and obesity risk differed by country of origin, diabetes prevalence was typically higher for immigrant groups vs United States (US)-born individuals. Common barriers to achieving a healthy diet were food insecurity; lack of familiarity with US food procurement practices, food preparation methods, and dietary guidelines; lack of familiarity and distrust of US food processing and storage methods; alternative priorities for food purchasing (eg, freshness, cultural relevance); logistical obstacles (eg, transportation); stress; and ethnic identity maintenance. Conclusions: To improve the health of immigrant populations, understanding similarities in cardiometabolic health disparities, diet, and barriers to health across immigrant communities"”traversing racial/ethnic subgroups"”may serve as a useful framework. This framework can guide research, policy, and public health practices to be more cohesive, generalizable, and meaningfully inclusive.

BACKGROUND:Community-based needs assessments are instrumental to address gaps in data collection and reporting, as well as to guide research, policy, and practice decisions to address health disparities in under-resourced communities. OBJECTIVES:The New York University Center for the Study of Asian American Health collaboratively developed and administered a large-scale health needs assessment in diverse, low-income Asian American and Pacific Islander communities in New York City and three U.S. regional areas using an in-person or web-based, community-engaged approach. METHODS:Community-engaged processes were modified over the course of three survey rounds, and findings were shared back to communities of interest using community preferred channels and modalities. LESSONS LEARNED:Sustaining multiyear, on-the-ground engagement to drive community research efforts requires active bidirectional communication and delivery of tangible support to maintain trust between partners. CONCLUSIONS:Findings to facilitate community health programming and initiatives were built from lessons learned and informed by new and existing community-based partners.

Alzheimer's disease and related dementias (AD/ADRD) disparities exist in the rapidly growing and extremely heterogeneous Asian American and Native Hawaiian and Pacific Islander (NH/PI) ageing populations in the United States. Limited community-clinical resources supporting culturally competent and timely diagnosis exacerbate barriers to existing care services in these populations. Community-based participatory research or community-engaged research are proven community-academic research approaches that can support the development and implementation of community-focused programmes to maximise community benefit. The NYU Center for the Study of Asian American Health engaged our national and local community partners to gain a deeper understanding of AD/ADRD in this diverse and growing population, to develop a strategic community-engaged research agenda to understand, address and reduce AD/ADRD disparities among Asian American and NH/PI communities. Findings from an initial scoping review identified significant research gaps. We conducted a series of key informant interviews (n = 11) and a modified Delphi survey (n = 14) with Asian American and NH/PI community leaders and older adult service providers followed by a facilitated group discussion of survey findings to gain consensus on key priority research areas identified in the literature and to determine culturally and contextually appropriate approaches to support AD/ADRD prevention, early identification and treatment in Asian American and NH/PI communities. Future research and health education should focus on raising Asian American and NH/PI basic individual- and community-level awareness about AD/ADRD and leveraging existing community assets to integrate effective engagement strategies to access AD/ADRD services within the healthcare system.