Prostate cancer incidence and mortality rates in African-American men are highest in the world compared to the general population. Twice as many African-Americans die of this disease. The reasons for this increased risk for African-American men could be due to inherent biological differences or due to the differences in exogenous factors such as diets, lifestyle, and socio-economic status. We decided to invest efforts in both biological research and community outreach programs to reduce the mortality rate in African- American men because of prostate cancer. Prevention and early detection of the disease are keys to reducing the death rate. Therefore educating the community on preventive measures and regular screenings for prostate cancer are essential in any outreach activity. Due to the lack of expertise at CCRTD, we initiated collaborations with the Whitney M. Young, Jr. School of Social Work, Division of Communication Arts and Midtown Urology Educational Foundation who have a rich history of working in the African- American community and dissemination of information through the mass media. We propose to organize educational programs in collaboration with these entities to provide information to the community about prostate healthy diets, physical activity and early screenings. These programs specifically will be: 1) To organize cook-offs once a year to educate men, specifically those of underrepresented populations, on the health benefits of proper nutrition and diet. 2) To utilize the media outlets (CAU TV and radio stations) for the purpose of providing prostate cancer related educational information to the African-American community in the Atlanta area. 3) To host a community health fair with free health screenings in conjunction with our annual national symposium on prostate cancer. We will develop instruments and statistical procedures to measure the success of these activities. The addition of this new Core will complete the objectives set by CCRTD and Clark Atlanta University.
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