Community Health

The Meharry Family and Community Medicine Program Centers offer a range of grant-funded, research-based initiatives, ranging from driving safety, to smoking cessation and obesity interventions, to continuing education for healthcare professionals and outreach to community organizations.

These centers serve to promote the holistic mission of the Department of Family and Community Medicine by providing support for a variety of essential program areas. Together, these program centers advance the complementary goals of the Family and Community Medicine Department.

The following offers brief descriptions of each—click here for more specific information.

AHEC
The Area Health Education Centers Program of Tennessee (AHEC) addresses the culturally sensitive healthcare intervention education opportunities for providers, combined with action to resolve healthcare and education access disparities in underserved populations.

Unintentional Injury Prevention Center/Passenger Safety
In collaboration with State Farm Insurance, Ford Motor Company, National Highway Traffic Safety Administration, and other supporters, the Unintentional Injury Prevention Center creates and disseminates toolkits for motor vehicle safety instruction for parents and in minority communities.

The Center for Healthy Families and Clinical Prevention
The Center for Healthy Families provides programming that integrates the multidisciplinary efforts of social workers, nurses, behaviorists, nutritionists, family physicians, preventive medicine physicians, and residents in collaboration with the local community. Together, they develop novel mechanisms for prevention and treatment of key health problems (like nicotine addiction and obesity), utilizing behavioral modification, stages of change, and group care. By examining communities assessing needs, and following the governing principles of community health, the clinical unit develops programs that improve quality of life.

Nashville Urban Partnership Academic Center of Excellence (NUPACE)Established in 2006 to promote a partnership between academic institutions and communities, NUPACE integrates prevention science and community action to reduce violence among youth in Nashville, Tennessee. Programs and activities include summer camps, mentoring, job fairs, and safety.

Fetal Alcohol Syndrome Disorders (FASD)
The Southeastern Fetal Alcohol Syndrome Regional Training Center, in partnership with Morehouse School of Medicine, University of Louisville, University of Tennessee, and Tennessee State University, provides training for health professionals and students throughout the southeastern United States from experts on fetal alcohol syndrome spectrum disorders and prevention.

National Health Disparities Research Center of Excellence (HDRCOE)
The mission of the National Health Disparities Research Center of Excellence at Meharry is to eliminate health disparities, promote health equity, inform public policy, and transform public health practice through the advancement of academic/community partnerships and promotion of the use of public health informatics in bio-medical, clinical, health services and translational research. Studies regarding cancer, HIV/AIDS, infant mortality, injury, cardio-metabolic, and mental-health disparities receive special emphasis.