Health Disparities

View Principal Investigators in Health Disparities

Despite the amazing advances made in healthcare over the past century, we still deal with challenges in reducing the differences in health status between groups of people. These health disparities—inequalities among different populations in terms of disease incidence, prevalence, morbidity, and mortality—affect a wide range of populations, including women, children, ethnic minorities, residents of rural areas, the elderly, and persons with disabilities. While some issues, such as varying access to care, are beyond the remit of biomedical research, our scientists can play an important role in addressing and easing health disparities.

The Intramural Research Program (IRP) is dedicated to advancing knowledge leading to better health for everyone, and to that aim we work towards understanding the many complex causes of health disparities and developing effective interventions to overcome them. Some of our program goals are:

• To conduct research focused on the links between biological and non-biological determinants of health
• To create training and mentorship opportunities for our intramural researchers focused on health disparities research
• To utilize Centers of Excellence and Community-Based Participatory Research Programs to expand intramural health disparities research into both urban and rural communities

Our researchers tackle the most pressing issues of our time, including cancer, AIDS, diabetes, infant mortality, and cardiovascular disease.

To find out more about how IRP scientists contribute to research aimed at eliminating health disparities, visit the Health Disparities Interest Group website, which includes information on upcoming and archived HDIG seminars.