The University of New Mexico (UNM) School of Medicine has a currently funded award under Section 736 for Programs of Excellence in Health Professions Education for Underrepresented Minority Individuals. Its most recent award runs to September 2004. Based on (1) the relatively small size of its endowments and (2) UNM's not being in the top 75 recipients of NIH grant awards (rank is 88), this application is for an NCMHD Endowment $21 Capacity Building Award. The endowment will be placed within the University of New Mexico Foundation, which presently exists in order to manage the University's endowment funds. Income is estimated at 5% of the corpus. The income will be used to support research on health disparities in New Mexico and the Southwest. Specifically, the income will support research identifying, describing, and analyzing health disparities among underrepresented minority populations and/or evaluating interventions designed to reduce disparities. During the project period the funds will go for assistantships for underrepresented minority health professions students and pre-professional students and will be used also to cover incidental expenses incurred in such research. The capacity created by the use of endowment income will assist the School's Institute for Public Health in advancing its mission to """"""""Improve health status and reduce disparities for populations in New Mexico through actions and resources of the University and its partners."""""""" If there is sufficient income, it will help finance pilot studies needed for the Institute to improve its competitiveness in conducting investigational research on health disparities. It will also assist with the recruitment, support, and maintenance of minority students in the health professions and provide opportunity for mentoring relationships and for focus on issues of health disparities. It may assist with development of new endowment funds from local sources.
