This project is designed to bring the data bases of the National Library of Medicine via internet to the students of Florida Memorial College and to the clients and staff members of community partners in the surrounding communities. This access will introduce participants to the much needed health information that will help to guide health decision-making and enhance the elimination of the common disparities that exist within minority communities.

Our project will be based at Florida Memorial University with the National Library of Medicine databases will be included as a required reference in Epidemiology, Biology and Chemistry classes; but will outreach and provide internet training sessions in the African American communities of Northwest Miami-Dade Country.

The target populations for this project will include college students, faculty and staff at the Florida Memorial College campus, clients and staff of the Economic Opportunity Family Health Center, Inc, a federally-qualified community health center, and clients and staff from the Christ Crusaders, Inc., a faith-based social service agency.

Life expectancy and overall health have improved in recent years for most Americans, thanks in part to an increased focus on preventive medicine and dynamic new advances in medical technology. However, not all Americans are benefiting equally. For too many racial and ethnic minorities in the United States, good health is elusive, since appropriate care is often associated with an individual’s economic status, race, and gender.

This project provides an excellent method for increasing both knowledge and awareness of pre-diabetes, type 2 diabetes and cardiovascular disease – major sources of morbidity and mortality among minority populations in this country. The project will focus on the development of a science curriculum that incorporates the use of NLM online resources to education and inform middle school students about health disparities in general, and more specifically about diabetes and cardiovascular diseases. This early intervention is intended to stimulate behavior and life style changes needed to reduce or prevent modifiable risk factors that may predispose your to the development of these diseases in later life.

Heart disease is the number one cause of death in the rural Marshall County, Mississippi area. In an effort to address this problem, Rust College will conduct an outreach project to raise public awareness of how to take advantage of the National Library of Medicine’s online resources to help to eliminate disparities in heart disease. Rust College faculty, staff, and students, as well as community residents (include middle school health science teachers) will be trained to utilize the NLM databases to retrieve information about heart disease prevention. Faculty members will create curriculum related to heart health, involving the use of NLM online databases for selected biology, chemistry, computers science and mathematics courses. A campus NLM reference room will be created in the McDonald Science Building to promote health information literacy through the use of NLM online resources training and heart health awareness information dissemination. The reference room will extend community access to necessary health and medical information. Trained students will engage in community education activities promoting health at local churches and provide instruction on how to use the health information resources from NLM.

The collaborating partners for this project include the Rust College Division of Science and Mathematics, Rust College Library, Rust College Community Development Center, Marshall County Library, Anderson Chapel African Methodist Church, Asbury Methodist Church, Bank of Holly Springs, Holly Springs Middle School, and Byhalia Middle School.

Huston-Tillotson College (HTC), in collaboration with its community and health agency partners (Austin-Travis County Department of Health and Human Services, Mental Health Mental Retardation, the Black Church Outreach Project, the African American AIDS Alliance, Central Texas Communities of Color Health Network, American Heart Association, and the Wright House HIV/AIDS Wellness Center), will increase the opportunity for the campus and its surrounding underserved community to improve their access to health information through the HCT Health Connection Online Project. Representatives for this extensive campus-community health partnership as well as student peer educators, faculty, staff and administrators, will become trained and certified as Consumer Health Advocates (CHAs) to provide National library of Medicine database online health access skills to the campus and surrounding community.