Call for Abstracts ...

...for professionals and students have been extended until April 30, 2012!

On behalf of the 12th Symposium on Minorities, the Medically Underserved & Health Equity, we would like to offer an opportunity for you and your organization to share the important work you are accomplishing within your community. Our theme this year is
“Empowering Communities In the Era of Health Care Reform.” In keeping with this theme, the ICC invites papers that specifically address the following:

• Basic, clinical, and behavioral research,

• Community-based program research and evaluation,

• Health services research,

• Health policy research, or

• Successful implementation of community-based programs.

We are interested in papers and projects that address the disproportionate impact of cancer and chronic disease on racial, ethnic and medically underserved populations. Appropriate topics include the major cancer sites, or cancer sites with disparate rates for specific population groups; diet, nutrition and obesity; environmental factors; tobacco; family history and genetics; cultural competency; health services research (including access and quality of care) and health statistics; community and faith-based health interventions; quality of life and end of life concerns; public health policy; children and the elderly; and survivorship and caregivers. For the community-based success stories (CBSS), we are specifically looking for examples of successfully engaging policy makers; building and maintaining coalitions; measuring outcomes; addressing social determinants of health; preventing chronic diseases; and screening, treatment and survivorship.

To be inclusive of the rich diversity of research, intervention and best practices that affect the health of minority populations, we welcome abstracts from students, professionals and community members. In addition to evaluating abstracts for quality, conference planners will give consideration to the importance of ethnic and geographic diversity in determining the conference program.

Each oral presentation will be limited to 15 minutes. Abstracts not selected for oral presentation will automatically be considered for a poster presentation. A laptop computer, projector and PowerPoint software will be available for all presenters. As the Symposium is striving to go "green," we plan to upload slide presentations and/or handouts to the conference website for later download by participants and the public. As such, we will not be reproducing any handouts for these sessions. Your submission implies consent to post your abstract, slide presentation and any handouts on the conference website, which will be viewable by the larger public.

We look forward to hearing from you and receiving your abstract(s) by April 16, 2012.

Sincerely,

Lee Buenconsejo-Lum, MD Program Chair

Richard Hajek, PhD Abstract Committee Chair

12th Biennial Symposium on Minorities, the Medically Underserved and Health Equity