Insights Gained From Developing Academic-Community Partnerships for Minority Aging, Community-Engaged Research

Abstract Increasingly community-engaged research, characterized by collaborations between researchers and community partners, is recognized as an important part of translating research into improved health outcomes and reduced health disparities for community participants. Training community participants to engage in some or all aspects of this research, particularly focusing on racial and ethnic minority older adults, highlights the need to understand its opportunities and challenges. With this symposium we will discuss and reflect on community-engaged and community-based participatory research approaches to community-academic partnerships with minority older adults. The first presentation addresses recruitment, retention, and training of a community advisory board of older African Americans in Michigan. The second presentation addresses a health education outreach and engagement program to improve health outcomes among older African Americans in California. The third presentation combines community engagement with survey design methods for research with older Native Hawaiian and Pacific Islander adults to improve data collection and health outcomes in this U.S. population. The final presentation examines partnerships between a hospital memory clinic, meal delivery service, research university, and low-income health clinic to improve caregiver and dementia patient outcomes for minority older adults. The symposium discussant will address opportunities, challenges, and implications of community-academic partnerships promoting minority aging.

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Building and Sustaining a Community Advisory Board of African American Older Adults as the Foundation for Volunteer Research Recruitment and Retention in Health Sciences.

Ethnicity & Disease ◽

10.18865/ed.30.s2.755 ◽

2020 ◽

Vol 30 (Suppl) ◽

pp. 755-764

Author(s):

Jamie Mitchell ◽

Tam Perry ◽

Vanessa Rorai ◽

Joan Ilardo ◽

Peter Lichtenberg ◽

...

Keyword(s):

Older Adults ◽

African American ◽

African Americans ◽

Behavioral Health ◽

Advisory Board ◽

Community Advisory Board ◽

Research Recruitment ◽

Recruitment And Retention ◽

Older African Americans ◽

African American Older Adults

Older African Americans’ participation in health-related research is severely limited; they are not involved in sufficient numbers to ensure the applicability of advancements in medical and behavioral health. This research participation gap exacerbates older African Americans’ vulnerability to poor health outcomes and disparities. The Michigan Center for Urban African American Aging Research employs a progressive community-based participatory model that utilizes a structured community advisory board (CAB) of African American older adults in metro Detroit, Michigan to oversee the research recruitment and retention of fellow minority older adult research participants. CAB members develop and support community health programming that provides free resources to older adults and also serves as fertile ground for recruiting participants in a volunteer research registry. CAB members are also provided ongoing training on social and behavioral health research and are supported in acting as a consultancy to outside researchers where they can be compensated for their expertise and engagement. This community-engaged model of sustaining a CAB of African American older adults offers key lessons learned on building relationships and trust, valuing and leveraging community members’ expertise and time, sharing decision-making, and fostering genuine community all while promoting research recruitment and retention among underserved populations.Ethn Dis. 2020;30(Suppl 2):755-764; doi:10.18865/ed.30.S2.755

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Longitudinal relationship of religious coping with racial discrimination and health outcomes among older African-Americans

PsycEXTRA Dataset ◽

10.1037/e634112013-094 ◽

2011 ◽

Author(s):

Amy D. Owen ◽

R. David Hayward

Keyword(s):

African Americans ◽

Health Outcomes ◽

Religious Coping ◽

Racial Discrimination ◽

Older African Americans ◽

Relationship Of

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Examining resources and their influence on developmental health outcomes in older African Americans

10.31274/etd-180810-4395 ◽

2015 ◽

Author(s):

Meneka Johnson

Keyword(s):

African Americans ◽

Health Outcomes ◽

Older African Americans ◽

Developmental Health

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Medical and Social Determinants of Brain Health and Dementia in a Multicultural Community Cohort of Older Adults

Journal of Alzheimer s Disease ◽

10.3233/jad-215020 ◽

2021 ◽

pp. 1-14

Author(s):

James E. Galvin ◽

Stephanie Chrisphonte ◽

Lun-Ching Chang

Keyword(s):

Older Adults ◽

Health Disparities ◽

African Americans ◽

Health Outcomes ◽

Sex Education ◽

Screening Program ◽

Healthcare Services ◽

Social Dimension ◽

Medical Comorbidities ◽

Race Ethnicity

Background: Socioeconomic status (SES), race, ethnicity, and medical comorbidities may contribute to Alzheimer’s disease and related disorders (ADRD) health disparities. Objective: Analyze effects of social and medical determinants on cognition in 374 multicultural older adults participating in a community-based dementia screening program. Methods: We used the Montreal Cognitive Assessment (MoCA) and AD8 as measures of cognition, and a 3-way race/ethnicity variable (White, African American, Hispanic) and SES (Hollingshead index) as predictors. Potential contributors to health disparities included: age, sex, education, total medical comorbidities, health self-ratings, and depression. We applied K-means cluster analyses to study medical and social dimension effects on cognitive outcomes. Results: African Americans and Hispanics had lower SES status and cognitive performance compared with similarly aged Whites. We defined three clusters based on age and SES. Cluster #1 and #3 differed by SES but not age, while cluster #2 was younger with midlevel. Cluster #1 experienced the worse health outcomes while cluster #3 had the best health outcomes. Within each cluster, White participants had higher SES and better health outcomes, African Americans had the worst physical performance, and Hispanics had the most depressive symptoms. In cross-cluster comparisons, higher SES led to better health outcomes for all participants. Conclusion: SES may contribute to disparities in access to healthcare services, while race and ethnicity may contribute to disparities in the quality and extent of services received. Our study highlights the need to critically address potential interactions between race, ethnicity, and SES which may better explain disparities in ADRD health outcomes.

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Temporal aspects of wellbeing in later life: gardening among older African Americans in Detroit

Ageing and Society ◽

10.1017/s0144686x19000813 ◽

2019 ◽

Vol 40 (12) ◽

pp. 2614-2634

Author(s):

Jessica C. Robbins ◽

Kimberly A. Seibel

Keyword(s):

Older Adults ◽

African Americans ◽

Social Relations ◽

Multiple Scales ◽

Later Life ◽

Structural Inequality ◽

City Life ◽

Social And Emotional ◽

Older African Americans ◽

Nuanced Understanding

AbstractGardening has well-established physical, social and emotional benefits for older adults in varied circumstances. In Detroit, Michigan (United States of America), as in many cities, policy makers, funders, researchers, community organisations and residents regard gardening as a means of transforming bodies, persons, communities, cities and broader polities. We draw on ethnographic research conducted during one gardening season with 27 older African Americans in Detroit to foreground the social dimensions of wellbeing in later life and thus develop a more robust and nuanced understanding of gardening's benefits for older adults. Based on anthropological understandings of personhood and kinship, this article expands concepts of wellbeing to include social relations across multiple scales (individual, interpersonal, community, state) and temporalities (of the activity itself, experiences of ageing, city life). Even when performed alone, gardening fosters connections with the past, as gardeners are reminded of deceased loved ones through practices and the plants themselves, and with the future, through engagement with youth and community. Elucidating intimate connections and everyday activities of older African American long-term city residents counters anti-black discourses of ‘revitalisation’. An expansive concept of wellbeing has implications for understanding the generative potential of meaningful social relations in later life and the vitality contributed by older adults living in contexts of structural inequality.

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New Evidence on the Biobehavioral Mechanisms of Chronic Pain in Aging African Americans

Innovation in Aging ◽

10.1093/geroni/igaa057.2839 ◽

2020 ◽

Vol 4 (Supplement_1) ◽

pp. 784-784

Author(s):

Staja Booker

Keyword(s):

Older Adults ◽

Chronic Pain ◽

African Americans ◽

Racial Differences ◽

Pain Catastrophizing ◽

Later Life ◽

Genetic Alterations ◽

Cross Sectional ◽

Older African Americans ◽

New Evidence

Abstract African American older adults are living longer with chronic pain, which presents a huge personal and societal burden. A growing group of scholars are now devoted to accurately and precisely characterizing and phenotyping the experience of pain in aging using within-group and advanced methodological designs to elucidate the biopsychosocial-behavioral responses to pain. In this symposium, five dynamic presenters present new evidence on mechanisms of pain in older African-Americans. Dr. Roach’s investigation reveals the effect of genetic alterations of sickle cell disease (SCD) on stress-related pain in younger and older adults; this scientific inquiry is especially important because there is little research on SCD in aging. Next, Dr. Terry, extends these findings by exploring the association between psychosocial factors such as experiences of discrimination, pain catastrophizing, and perceived stress on neural (brain) responses via magnetic resonance imaging. From a clinical perspective, Dr. Booker reports on the first-ever model of intra-racial differences in movement-evoked pain in older African-Americans with knee osteoarthritis and healthy controls. Our final two presenters use a translational approach to identify how older African-Americans cope with chronic pain. Dr. Robinson-Lane’s study highlights the unique experience and predictors of coping, adaptation, and self-management of chronic pain in Black dementia caregivers. Finally, Dr. Cobb’s research from a large cross-sectional study correlates social, behavioral, and health factors with opioid and psychotropic use in economically disadvantaged older African-Americans. This symposium offers novel ways of understanding social determinants of pain and assisting African-Americans and their caregivers to manage complex chronic pain in later life.

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The Importance of Psychosocial Factors in Aging: The Minority Aging Research Study

Innovation in Aging ◽

10.1093/geroni/igab046.997 ◽

2021 ◽

Vol 5 (Supplement_1) ◽

pp. 260-260

Author(s):

Lisa Barnes ◽

Brittney Lange-Maia ◽

Carlos Mendes de Leon

Keyword(s):

Cognitive Impairment ◽

African Americans ◽

Psychosocial Factors ◽

Healthy Aging ◽

Research Study ◽

Disease Risk ◽

Aging Research ◽

Older African Americans ◽

Longitudinal Association ◽

Minority Aging

Abstract Psychosocial factors can provide crucial insight into lived experiences that influence healthy aging. Though psychosocial factors are often used to explain health disparities seen between different racial/ethnic groups, within-group investigations can be particularly powerful for identifying culturally specific psychosocial factors that impact heterogeneity in aging among minority populations. The Minority Aging Research Study (MARS) is an ongoing, longitudinal epidemiologic cohort of 797 older African Americans from the Chicago, IL metropolitan area. Participants are on average 73.4 (standard deviation [SD]=6.6) years of age, 78.2% are women, and mean years of education is 14.8 (SD=3.7). At baseline, 75.3% of participants were without cognitive impairment, 20.8% had mild cognitive impairment, and 3.9% had mild dementia. Participants were recruited starting in 2004 and complete annual visits including a clinical evaluation, cognitive and motor testing, and assessment of risk factors related to Alzheimer’s Disease risk, including those hypothesized to be associated with a higher burden of cognitive impairment among older African Americans. This symposium will discuss the longitudinal association between John Henryism and cognitive function and decline (McSorley), participation in social activities and risk of all-cause mortality (Lamar), and the predictive relationship between experiences of everyday discrimination and incident disability (Lange-Maia). Finally, we will examine multilevel correlates—including environmental, sociocultural, behavioral, and biological factors—related to perceived stress (Glover). Mendes de Leon will critically consider what appear to be the most potent psychosocial factors for minority aging and possible implications of integrating these factors into interventions focused on promoting healthy aging among older African Americans.

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ADAPTIVE GARDENING PRACTICES AMONG OLDER AFRICAN AMERICANS IN DETROIT

Innovation in Aging ◽

10.1093/geroni/igz038.1901 ◽

2019 ◽

Vol 3 (Supplement_1) ◽

pp. S515-S515

Author(s):

Jessica C Robbins ◽

Kimberly Seibel

Keyword(s):

Older Adults ◽

African Americans ◽

Emotional Wellbeing ◽

Structural Inequality ◽

Social And Emotional ◽

Selective Optimization With Compensation ◽

Older African Americans ◽

Physical Abilities ◽

Physical Limitations ◽

Post Industrial

Abstract It is well established that gardening can promote physical, social, and emotional wellbeing for many older adults in varied circumstances (Milligan, Gatrell, and Bingley 2004; Nicklett, Anderson, and Yen 2016; Wang and MacMillan 2013). In post-industrial cities formed by historical and ongoing processes of structural inequality such as Detroit, Michigan, gardening is beneficial for residents in terms of health, economic activity, community-building, and city beautification (Lawson 2005; Pitt 2014; Pothukuchi 2015; White 2011). However, research has less frequently investigated how gardening can promote wellbeing for older adults living in contexts of urban structural inequality. This poster addresses this gap by exploring how older African American gardeners in Detroit adapt their gardening practices to changing physical abilities and capacities. Drawing on ethnographic research conducted during one gardening season (March-October 2017) with older African Americans in Detroit (n= 27), we employ a selective-optimization-with-compensation framework (Baltes and Baltes 1990) to understand the modifications that older Detroiters make in their gardening practices as they age. Findings demonstrate that older African Americans in Detroit engage in gardening in flexible, creative ways that accommodate new physical limitations, while also connecting to changes occurring in the city of Detroit. This study thus has implications for further understanding how gardening can benefit older adults, and how older adults can contribute vitality to contexts of structural inequality.

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Older African Americans' Experience of the Opioid Crisis

Innovation in Aging ◽

10.1093/geroni/igaa057.261 ◽

2020 ◽

Vol 4 (Supplement_1) ◽

pp. 79-80

Author(s):

Sharon Rainer

Keyword(s):

Older Adults ◽

African Americans ◽

Community Based Participatory Research ◽

Medical Community ◽

Senior Center ◽

Opioid Crisis ◽

Older African Americans ◽

College Of Nursing ◽

Axial Coding ◽

Opioid Users

Abstract In 2017, over 1200 Philadelphians died from opioid overdoses and an estimated 50,000 -70,000 people in the city are addicted to opioids. The opioid crisis is a family crisis that touches all communities affecting those using opioids, their family members, and the community. As policymakers develop responses to the opioid crisis, a multigenerational perspective is critical. With much published on the opioid crisis, there remains little understanding of older adult’s perceptions or experiences to this public health emergency. Older adults bring a unique voice. They are grandparents, parents, opioid users, and people living with chronic pain and/or addictions. Center in the Park (CIP), a nationally accredited senior center in Philadelphia, Pennsylvania sought to understand older African Americans’ perceptions of the opioid crisis and how their experiences inform senior center programming. CIP leadership sought a community partnership with Thomas Jefferson University College of Nursing to respond to what some in their community called “a domino effect” of the opioid crisis. Using a Community-Based Participatory Research Model rooted in humanistic research theory, a qualitative study was designed. Three focus groups (n29) were convened. All focus group recordings were transcribed and checked for accuracy. An iterative axial coding process was used. All transcripts were coded using the qualitative software program NVivo12. Findings suggest older adults are concerned about younger generations and addictions. In addition, older adults lack knowledge of the use and safety of opioids and have a general mistrust of the medical community to adequately limit the opioid epidemic.

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