? CLINICAL CORE The overall goal of the Clinical Core is to generate data and biospecimens to support high quality, cutting edge, externally-funded clinical, epidemiologic, neurobiologic, and biomarker studies of aging that focus on better defining normal aging and the transition from normal aging to mild cognitive impairment (MCI) to the earliest stages of dementia among older Blacks. The Clinical Core has demonstrated expertise and success in conducting studies with older persons under-represented in aging research. It provides participants, clinical data, and biospecimens (brain tissue, DNA, and blood) to support a wide variety of studies by investigators at Rush and across the county, particularly those that historically have had limited data from diverse groups (e.g., neuroimaging, genomics, epigenomics, proteomics, and metabolomics). The Core will continue to recruit, enroll, and perform annual clinical evaluations including the UDS and tests that are compatible with the Religious Orders Study and Latino Cores, on older Blacks without dementia, and increase awareness of the importance of brain donation through culturally-tailored educational programs. This Core represents one of the largest sources of brain tissue from older Blacks in the U.S. By focusing on older Blacks, a population at high risk for AD, to provide clinical data, brain tissue, and DNA, the Clinical Core will continue to serve as a vital resource to the wider aging and AD research community, not only for advancing the science of recruitment and inclusion for under-represented populations in research, but also for addressing health disparities for one of the most feared diseases of our time.
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