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HOPES publishes evaluation of COVID-19 vaccination campaign
AltaMed Health Services, in partnership with other federally qualified health centers (FQHCs) and community-based organizations, led
a yearlong COVID-19 vaccination campaign, ¡Andale! ¿Que Esperas? (AQE), aiming to increase vaccine access and confidence in Latinx communities across California. This $11 million campaign was funded by the U.S. Health Resources and Services Administration (HRSA). Expanding the community health worker (CHW) workforce was a critical objective of AQE, and Center for HOPES evaluators Saira Nawaz, Anne Trinh, Kyle Moon, and Jasmin Navarrete recently published their mixed-methods evaluation of AQE in Journal of Community Health. Their evaluation identifies the importance, needs, and perils of CHW models in the COVID-19 era and beyond. You can read the article here.
Spotlight on Figueroa for research on stress, resilience, and health disparities
Center for HOPES Research Scientist Wilson Figueroa provided an in-depth interview on his research, the Examining Race, gender Identity, and Sexual orientation for health Equity (RISE) study.
Learn more about his community-engaged work here and reach out to him for questions and/or opportunities for collaborations via email at figueroa.123@osu.edu. Read more
Center evaluators hold community training
From Wednesday, September 28 to Friday, September 30, the Center for HOPES’ Director of Health Services Research, Dr. Saira Nawaz and Evaluator and Community Engagement Specialist, Anne Trinh conducted an evaluation training for the Center for Public Health Innovation at Columbus Public Health and their community partners. Read more
Nawaz and Moon present at ARM 2022
Center for HOPES Research Evaluator Saira Nawaz and Research Associate Kyle Moon presented at this year’s AcademyHealth Annual Research Meeting in Washington, D.C. Nawaz participated in an all-star panel on measuring racism in health research and Moon presented a poster on the evaluation team’s work with community health workers. Read more
Center for HOPES Releases 2021 Annual Report
It was another busy year for Center for Health Outcomes and Policy Evaluation Studies! Building on 2020’s strong staffing and project expansions, we focused our attention on deepening our community engagement efforts in 2021. Guided by our mission to support health equity and social justice, we’re proud to report another impactful year of advancing the university’s land grant mission through innovative evaluation, policy, and outcomes research for the public good.
Read about our new projects and continuing efforts in the Center for HOPES 2021 Annual Report.
Support our work by donating to the Center for HOPES Support Fund.
Figueroa invited to join SGM research consortium
Center for HOPES Research Scholar Wilson Figueroa has been invited to join the Midwest SGM (Sexual and Gender Minorities) Health Research Consortium. The Consortium is a collaborative group of university researchers and community partners focused on identifying, understanding, and addressing the health needs of diverse SGM individuals through transdisciplinary and community-engaged research. Per the group’s website, “[a] major focus of the Consortium is to study the structural, social, and psychological determinants of health disparities for SGM communities and to design and implement evidence-informed and evidence-based interventions to reduce health disparities.” Dr. Figueroa shares these goals. Read more about how the RISE Study examines discrimination as a determinant of health.
Seiber receives prestigious teaching award
Congratulations to Center for HOPES Director Eric Seiber for being awarded the university’s Alumni Award for Distinguished Teaching. The university recognizes up to 10 faculty per year for their teaching excellence. Dr. Seiber’s former doctoral student and Center researcher Evan Goldstein, now an assistant professor at the University of Utah, nominated him for this prestigious honor. Read more
Blog: Examining discrimination as a determinant of health
Center for HOPES Research Scholar Wilson Figueroa is wrapping up recruitment and data collection for his study on the effects of daily minority stressors in queer persons of color. The primary aim of the Examining Race, gender Identity, and Sexual orientation for health Equity (RISE) Study is to examine the effects of individual, interpersonal, and structural stressors on physiological markers of stress among queer people of color, including the effects on diurnal cortisol.
Most recently, Figueroa was selected to take part in the 2022 CCTS Launch to K Grant-Writing Workshop. The goal of the program is to guide early career scholars through the process of writing a high-quality K grant submission. During the competitive review process for participation in the workshop, the committee found tremendous promise in the RISE Study, so will work with Figueroa to refine and strengthen his proposal over the course of the three-month program.
We talked with Figueroa about how the RISE Study contributes to health equity research by examining the role of discrimination in minority health outcomes. Figueroa also explained how, through rigorous design, methods, and analysis, health outcomes research can advance equity and justice in public health, health care practice, and health policy.
Read more about the RISE Study as health policy scholarship and what drives Dr. Figueroa in his work.
Other work from Center for HOPES researcher
Center for HOPES Research Scholar Wilson Figueroa is co-author of an article in the new issue of Cancer Medicine. College of Public Health colleague Tasleem Padamsee, and their co-authors compare three different breast cancer risk prediction models among a community-based sample to identify women who have a high risk of getting breast cancer. Read more
Nawaz presents to physicians on community resilience
Center for HOPES Research Evaluator Saira Nawaz recently co-presented a lecture for the Educating the Whole Physician Lecture Series at Notre Dame University’s John J. Reilly Center. On March 23, 2022, Nawaz and Dr. Gloria Itzel Montiel gave their talk titled “Centering Community to Advance Health Equity: Lessons from Evaluation of Co-Developed Interventions in Latinx Communities.” Drs. Nawaz and Montiel presented a story of community resilience, using community-based participatory research and implementation science to mobilize and activate communities for social change and health equity in the context of the COVID-19 pandemic. Read more
Figueroa research on stress effects in LGBTQ+ adults lauded
The Society for Health Psychology has selected “Daily Stressors and Diurnal Cortisol Among Sexual and Gender Minority Young Adults,” authored by Center for HOPES Research Scholar Wilson Figueroa as its highlight of the month for March. In the 2021 study published in Health Psychology, Dr. Figueroa and his colleagues report the results of their study on sexual and gender minority stress and diurnal cortisol, the changes in the stress-sensitive hormone. Their findings suggest that there is a unique relationship between the everyday experience of sexual and gender minority stressors and cortisol levels throughout the day, which has implications for the physical and mental health of lesbian, gay, bisexual/pansexual, trans, nonbinary, and gender diverse individuals. Congratulations, Dr. Figueroa!
Read the article: Figueroa, W. S., Zoccola, P. M., Manigault, A. W., Hamilton, K. R., Scanlin, M. C., & Johnson, R. C. (2021). Daily stressors and diurnal cortisol among sexual and gender minority young adults. Health Psychology, 40(2), 145. http://dx.doi.org/10.1037/hea0001054. Supplemental Materials: http://dx.doi.org/10.1037/hea0001054.supp
Partnership with City of Columbus, Center for Public Health Innovation
The Center for HOPES is partnering with the City of Columbus, Center for Public Health Innovation (CPHI) to address COVID-19 health disparities in Franklin County, Ohio. This work is funded by the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention’s National Initiative to Address COVID-19 Health Disparities Among Populations at High-Risk and Underserved, Including Racial and Ethnic Minority Populations and Rural Communities. Over the next two years, Saira Nawaz and Anne Trinh, evaluators and community engagement specialists at the Center for HOPES, will work with CPHI and other collaborators, including the Kirwan Institute and community-based organizations serving racial/ethnic minority groups, to support COVID-19 recovery efforts and build sustainable practices to improve health equity. Read more.
Blog: Evaluation’s role in community engagement & empowerment
Center for HOPES evaluators Saira Nawaz and Anne Trinh recently returned from the west coast on a site visit to AltaMed’s vaccination outreach program. The aim of the program is to increase COVID-19 vaccinations among the Latinx community in southern California by bolstering a community-based workforce of outreach and health workers.
Visiting San Ysidro Health Center’s mobile health clinic
This work is funded by the Health Resources and Services Administration (HRSA) and led by AltaMed, the nation’s largest federally qualified health center. The Center for HOPES’s charge is to evaluate the program’s effectiveness at increasing vaccinations in the target communities. The site visit was written into our scope of work specifically to ensure that sites are collecting data required for the funder as well as information that is useful to AltaMed and its partner organizations in serving their communities.
Read more about how program evaluation is an opportunity to build relationships and bridge research and practice. Want to expand your own evaluation expertise? Enroll in our Evaluation Certificate Program!
View older updates on our Blog & News page
The Center for HOPES is a research center in The Ohio State University College of Public Health. HOPES provides health economics, health policy, and evaluation services for projects within the university, as well as for government agencies, community groups, and private sector organizations. In addition to the Center’s accomplished researchers, HOPES provides a platform for the research community to collaborate across colleges in order to better understand the issues facing the public’s health today.
