PRC Research Core

The Research Core is made up of an implementation research project, the CDC-funded Special Interest Projects (SIPs), and thematic networks.  

2024-2029: Core Research Project

Improving social connectedness among older adults is an important health problem prioritized by the CDC; certain communities continue to be disproportionately impacted by loneliness and isolation, including LGBTQ+ (lesbian, bisexual, gay, transgender, queer/questioning, and other sexual and gender minority) older adults. Older LGBT+ adults often experience worse health than their heterosexual/ cisgender peers, and, although evidence-based interventions to improve social connectedness among older LGBTQ+ adults have been tested in research environments, their scale up is urgently needed in community settings. We have an experienced, innovative, and multi-disciplinary team of world-renowned geriatricians who have developed, implemented, and evaluated evidenced-based, peer-support interventions for older adults and who have existing relationships with community groups who can do the work of adapting and replicating these interventions in broad and diverse community settings.

To respond to the epidemic of loneliness and social isolation among LGBTQ+ adults, the PRC will facilitate significant and innovative health science research through partnerships with public health colleagues that ultimately improves community health with the following goals:

  1. Enhance Social Connectedness: We aim to reduce loneliness and isolation among older LGBTQ+ adults by fostering meaningful social connections and improving mental well-being. 

  2. Implement Proven Interventions: By disseminating the Peer Outreach Program (POP), we seek to make effective, evidence-based strategies accessible and adaptable for diverse community settings.

  3. Establish Lasting Partnerships: We’ll collaborate with healthcare systems and community organizations to support and sustain interventions benefiting older LGBTQ+ adults.

  4. Promote Health Equity: Our focus includes addressing health disparities within LGBTQ+ populations by ensuring access to programs that support mental and social health

2024-2029 Special Interest Projects (SIPs)

Special interest projects (SIPs) are funded by CDC and other federal agencies. The funder outlines broad goals for each SIP, which is offered only to the PRCs, and the grantee is selected through competitive peer review. Each project is funded for at least one year, but many are multiyear projects that receive several million dollars. The following SIP is funded through the UCSF PRC:

There is considerable debate about removing the label of “cancer” from low-grade prostate cancer due to its indolent natural history. A related challenge is the optimal patient-centered presentation of pathology reports in the era of immediate electronic access to clinical results. A critical research gap is the perspective of diverse patient populations on prostate cancer nomenclature and pathology reporting. We will address this gap through 3 key approaches:

  1. We will perform qualitative studies of patient perspectives on prostate cancer nomenclature and preferences for a patient-centered pathology report.
  2. We will conduct discrete choice experiments to determine the impacts of changes in nomenclature for low-grade prostate cancer.
  3. We will conduct a randomized study to test the usefulness of alternative wording in pathology reports and of patient-centered pathology supplements. Our advisory board includes additional experts in prostate pathology, biostatistics and patients who will be involved in all stages of the research design and public dissemination of results.

The expected outcomes of this study will advance the field by studying the optimal prostate cancer nomenclature and pathology reporting in diverse patient populations.

Thematic Network

The thematic research network is a type of special interest project (SIP) that fund several PRCs to work together on a specific health issue. UCSF PRC coordinates the Nutrition and Obesity Policy Research and Evaluation Network (NOPREN).

2019-2024: Core Research Project: Healthy Divas

UCSF PRC's current research project is an implementation study of the Healthy Divas intervention in West Oakland, California. Healthy Divas was developed to address the unique care needs of transgender women living with HIV by providing relevant information, support, and skills building for the identification and accomplishment of individualized health care goals.

The implementation study is a Hybrid Type III design with a primary emphasis on the implementation process and secondary emphasis on the intervention outcomes. The RE-AIM framework is utilized to understand the implementation process, where reach refers to the individuals in the target population who participate in an intervention or program; effectiveness is the impact of an intervention on specific outcomes; adoption includes the settings, staff, and institutions that adopt and deliver an intervention or program; implementation involves the integration of the intervention into practice; and maintenance is the extent to which the intervention or program becomes a part of routine practice or policy.

Our partner in this effort is the California Prostitutes Education Project (Cal-PEP). Cal-PEP has been serving communities in Oakland for 33 years, with a focus on communities of color and those affected by HIV. Cal-PEP has recently been expanding its services to include transgender women and has successfully obtained funding to implement Healthy Divas over three years. We have collaborated with Cal-PEP on several research projects over the years and they have been represented on our CDC PRC Prevention Forum for 5 years. The PRC’s expertise in implementation science and the Healthy Divas intervention and Cal-PEP’s expertise in serving communities in Oakland, make this a unique, timely, and critical opportunity. This study will investigate the real-world implementation of an urgently needed intervention for a highly vulnerable population and will support the future adoption of Healthy Divas by other organizations in an expeditious manner.

Healthy Divas Logo

 

Healthy Diva particpant

 

2019-2024 Special Interest Projects (SIPs)

SIP20-001: Developing and Evaluating Adolescent, Parent, and Provider Resources to Improve Adolescent Use of Sexual Health Services. PIs: Kim Koester and Jyu-Lin Chen

The TRUST (Technology-based Resources to increase Uptake of Sexual health services for Teens) study is a CDC-funded pilot project. It is a technology-based intervention designed to increase the use of confidential sexual health services and alone time between teens and healthcare providers by strengthening the partnerships between adolescents, mothers, and healthcare providers.

SIP21-008: Examining Approaches to Improve Care and Management of People with Lupus. PI: Patti Katz

This study will assess the relationships of psychosocial factors with patient-reported outcomes (PROs) in people with lupus and identify modifiable factors that may improve PROs. The specific aims are to 1) assess the relationship of psychosocial factors and PROs among people with lupus, both cross-sectionally and longitudinally; 2) assess the impact of physical activity on associations between psychosocial variables and PROs; and 3) identify trajectories of PROs over time and the impact of social, psychological, and behavioral variables on those trajectories.

SIP22-003: Multi-institutional, Linked EHRs to Examine Factors and Diagnostic Pathways that Facilitate Early Ovarian Cancer Diagnosis. PIs: Mindy Hebert-Derouen and Judith Walsh

This project will study factors that facilitate earlier ovarian cancer diagnosis, including pre-diagnostic routes, timelines, and symptoms, using electronic health record data from three institutions linked to state cancer registry data and data on the neighborhood environment. With additional knowledge of factors that could facilitate earlier ovarian cancer diagnosis, we will estimate the population-level impact on ovarian cancer survival of shifting diagnoses to earlier stages. Results will be used to develop and disseminate public health messaging to shift ovarian cancer stage at diagnosis for females, communities, clinical providers, and healthcare systems.

2014 - 2019: Core Research Project: STYLE+

UCSF PRC's previous research project addresses a significant health disparity – HIV – among Black and Latino gay men who have sex with men (MSM). The intervention STYLE+ (“Strength Through Youth Livin’ Empowered”) seeks adapt and replicate STYLE, a model intervention designed to improve linkage of HIV-infected young MSM of color to clinical care. In collaboration with AIDS Project East Bay or APEB, the project was renamed M+ and has the following core elements:

  • Social marketing campaign
  • Community outreach & HIV testing
  • Red carpet HIV services
  • HIV+ support services
Participants of the STYLE Project in Oakland CA

 

Participants of the STYLE Project in Oakland CA

 

2014-2019 Special Interest Projects (SIPs)

SIP14-026 Cognitive Interviews of Executive Directors of Food Banks to Inform Improved Distribution of Healthy Foods

  • Barnidge, E., Stenmark, S., & Seligman, H. (2017). Clinic-to-Community Models to Address Food Insecurity. JAMA Pediatrics, 171(6), 507. doi:10.1001/jamapediatrics.2017.0067
  • Pooler, J. A., Hartline-Grafton, H., Debor, M., Sudore, R. L., & Seligman, H. K. (2018). Food Insecurity: A Key Social Determinant of Health for Older Adults. Journal of the American Geriatrics Society. doi:10.1111/jgs.15736
  • Seligman, H. K., & Berkowitz, S. A. (2018). Aligning Programs and Policies to Support Food Security and Public Health Goals in the United States. Annual Review of Public Health, 40(1). doi:10.1146/annurev-publhealth-040218-044132
  • Seligman, H. K., Smith, M., Rosenmoss, S., Marshall, M. B., & Waxman, E. (2018). Comprehensive Diabetes Self-Management Support From Food Banks: A Randomized Controlled Trial. American Journal of Public Health, 108(9), 1227-1234. doi:10.2105/ajph.2018.304528
  • Seligman, H. K. (2017). Food Insecurity and “Unexplained” Weight Loss. JAMA Internal Medicine,177(3), 421. doi:10.1001/jamainternmed.2016.8697
  • Wetherill, M. S., White, K. C., Rivera, C., & Seligman, H. K. (2018). Challenges and opportunities to increasing fruit and vegetable distribution through the US charitable feeding network: Increasing food systems recovery of edible fresh produce to build healthy food access. Journal of Hunger & Environmental Nutrition, 1-20. doi:10.1080/19320248.2018.1484315

SIP14-013 Understanding barriers to colorectal cancer screening in South Asians

  • Ellis, L., Abrahão, R., Mckinley, M., Yang, J., Somsouk, M., Marchand, L. L., Cheng, I., Gomez, S.L., & Shariff-Marco, S. (2018). Colorectal Cancer Incidence Trends by Age, Stage, and Racial/Ethnic Group in California, 1990–2014. Cancer Epidemiology Biomarkers & Prevention, 27(9), 1011-1018. doi:10.1158/1055-9965.epi-18-0030
  • Ivey, S. L., Mukherjea, A., Patel, A., Kapoor, N., Rau, S., Kazi, E., Bhatia J., Somsouk, & M., Tseng, W. (2018). Colorectal Cancer Screening Among South Asians: Focus Group Findings on Attitudes, Knowledge, Barriers and Facilitators. Journal of Health Care for the Poor and Underserved, 29(4), 1416-1437. doi:10.1353/hpu.2018.0104
  • Mukherjea, A., Ivey, S. L., Shariff-Marco, S., Kapoor, N., & Allen, L. (2017). Overcoming Challenges in Recruitment of South Asians for Health Disparities Research in the USA. Journal of Racial and Ethnic Health Disparities, 5(1), 195-208. doi:10.1007/s40615-017-0357-x

SIP14-012 Mailing FIT colorectal screening, partnership with Kaiser

  • Alsayid, M., Singh, M. H., Issaka, R., Laleau, V., Day, L., Lee, J., Allison, J., & Somsouk, M. (2018). Yield of Colonoscopy After a Positive Result From a Fecal Immunochemical Test OC-Light. Clinical Gastroenterology and Hepatology, 16(10). doi:10.1016/j.cgh.2018.04.014 
  • Issaka, R. B., Avila, P., Whitaker, E., Bent, S., & Somsouk, M. (2019). Population health interventions to improve colorectal cancer screening by fecal immunochemical tests: A systematic review. Preventive Medicine, 118, 113-121. doi:10.1016/j.ypmed.2018.10.021
  • Issaka, R. B., Singh, M. H., Rachocki, C., Day, L. W., Horton, C., & Somsouk, M. (2018). Missed Opportunities in Colorectal Cancer Prevention in Patients With Inadequate Bowel Preparations. Clinical Gastroenterology and Hepatology, 16(9), 1533-1534. doi:10.1016/j.cgh.2018.01.004
  • Wang, A., Rachocki, C., Shapiro, J. A., Issaka, R. B., & Somsouk, M. (2018). Low-literacy Level Instructions and Reminder Calls Improve Patient Handling of Fecal Immunochemical Test Samples. Clinical Gastroenterology and Hepatology. doi:10.1016/j.cgh.2018.11.050

SIP16-003 Small Media Interventions to Increase Colorectal Cancer Screening among Chinese Americans