Center of Excellence on Health Disparities


		Low Birth Weight/premature births are the major causes of infant mortality and childhood disabilities. African American infants born with low birth weight and/or complications of prematurity have a rate of 4 times that of infants born in the white population.
The state of Georgia has a very high infant mortality rate, ranking 40 th out of the 50 states. Southern states in general account for 30% of all access black infant mortality nationwide. In the southern states everyday four babies lives could be saved just by eliminating the black-white infant mortality gap.

Asthma is the most common chronic disease of childhood and the most common cause of preventable morbidity as measured by preventable hospitalizations emergency department visits, and missed school days. In the US alone nearly 15million people have asthma. It cost this country's healthcare system $6.2billion dollars every year. The minority and low-income populations are disproportionately affected. The asthma mortality rate is 3 times higher for this group then the general population.
There are higher increases in prevalence and rates of hospitalization.

		Maternal Child Health Core is doing research in both these areas of high-disparity and high-impact. We want to understand the causes of extreme disparities in premature labor, low birth weight, and very low birth weight births in African American versus Hispanic/Latino or white, non-Hispanic population.
The MCH core also understands the relative contribution of access to care, quality of care, patient self-management, and environmental factors to disparities in asthma morbidity. Our research teams are researching Birth Outcomes and Associated Costs among Medicaid Beneficiaries: Comparison of Health Care Delivery Option, also working with the Southeast Regional Clinicians Network Asthma Research Project, Improving Asthma Care and Outcomes in Safety Net Primary Care Settings, and School-based Asthma Study for Inner City Children.

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