Annual Report 2007 - Care at the
Care at the Community Level
As part of the UConn Health Center’s ongoing efforts to help faculty, staff and students reach out to the local community, the Ethel Donaghue Center for Translating Research Into Policy and Practice (TRIPP) provides an array of services to assist low-income and underrepresented populations that traditionally have the least access to health care and a disproportionate amount of need.
Funded through a $1.7-million grant from the Patrick & Catherine Weldon Donaghue Medical Research Foundation, the TRIPP Center is concerned with moving research from the clinical trial stage into the community and primary care practices.
Judith Fifield, Ph.D. (pictured, at right), director of the TRIPP Center, and her team work to translate evidence-based guidelines and standards of care into methods that work for providers and the community so that patients can benefit as quickly as possible.
One such initiative that has shown prodigious results is Sister Talk Hartford, a faith-based weight-control program for women that focuses on predominately black churches in greater Hartford. The program offers practical advice on such tried-and-true methods as understanding food labels, participating in sensible exercise regimens and finding healthier ways of cooking.
Mainstream weight-loss programs sometimes fail to take into consideration the social and economic pressures in black women’s lives, notes Fifield. That’s where reality-based programs like Sister Talk can make all the difference. A year after the initial program ended, approximately two-thirds of participants had maintained their weight or continued to lose.
“There is a gap of approximately 17 years, according to the Institute of Medicine, for the results of clinical trials to find their way into the hands of providers so that they can actually benefit patients,” says Fifield, a medical sociologist with a background in nursing.
“And, of course, whatever obstacles this presents are made that much worse by poverty and its associated problems. What we’re trying to do is include practitioners in the research process so that the translation will be easier and patients will benefit sooner. That’s the essence of our work.”
