The Annual National Conference of the Association for Medical Education and Research in Substance Abuse (AMERSA) is the major meeting for health professional educators who teach about alcohol and other drug problems. AMERSA's primary mission is twofold: to develop cadres of health professions educators and researchers knowledgeable about alcohol and other drug issues who are effective in transferring research to practice, and to encourage the development of educational programs focused on alcohol and other drug issues. The annual meeting gives physicians, nurses, social workers, and other health professionals the opportunity to increase their knowledge of scientific advances and new educational programs focused on alcohol and other drug issues. This proposal builds on AMERSA's 26-year history of successful annual national conferences. The proposed 5-year project will strengthen the high quality and diversity of the national meetings, to be held 2004-2008, by (1) providing fees to attract plenary speakers who are preeminent in the area of alcohol-related research, (2) exchanging and disseminating alcohol related research findings to a broad range of health professions educators and researchers; (3) creating greater awareness in this audience of methodological problems that can vitiate the quality of alcohol-related research; and (4) reaching out more actively to involve academic health professions educators, researchers and practitioners who work with underserved and high-risk populations experiencing alcohol-related problems, specifically, Latinos, African Americans, and women. The PI and Co-PI, recognized leaders in the substance abuse field, have conducted several NIAAA and NIDA-funded studies and are thus well qualified to direct this project. They will work with an interdisciplinary Advisory Committee that has expertise in translating research into practice, providing services to underserved populations, and teaching health professionals to adapt clinical methods to diverse patient groups. Other personnel for this project hold key roles in AMERSA with the organizational centrality necessary to implement proposed activities. Since the Annual National Conference draws a large number of participants from a variety of medical and other healthcare professions, the impact on clinical training and practice will be substantial.
