Hispanics in Texas are among the poorest of the poor in America. Undereducated and underserved by the health care system, they have dangerously high rates of diabetes, cardiovascular disease and cancer. They are also well on their way to becoming the majority population in the state.

The UT School of Public Health at Houston has established two new research centers to start tackling the multiple health and medical concerns of this rapidly growing population. The centers are located in El Paso on the Mexican border, with a 78 percent Hispanic population, and in Brownsville in the valley in South Texas, where 90 percent of the population is Hispanic.

Joe McCormick, M.D., assistant dean for the Brownsville regional campus and the James H. Steele Professor in Public Health explains: "We are looking at issues that are important and often unique to Hispanics. This is a population where there's never been any local research on health issues important to the people here."

Jack Bristol, Ph.D., co-director of the center in El Paso and professor of environmental and occupational health, says "We're looking at issues that are going to impact
the whole state eventually."

Bristol's project, the Hispanic Health Disparities Research Center, is a joint venture between the UT School of Public Health regional campus in El Paso and The University of Texas at El Paso (UTEP) College of Health Science. The center was established in late 2003 and funded by a five-year, $4.1 million grant from the National Institutes of Health (NIH). Bristol and his fellow researchers will review and award 13 -18 pilot projects among faculty from both institutions. McCormick's program in Brownsville, The Hispanic Health Research Center in the Lower Rio Grande Valley is a joint venture between the UT School of Public Health regional campus in Brownsville and The University of Texas at Brownsville and Texas Southmost College. It was established in early 2003 with a five-year,
$7.5 million development grant from the NIH. The grant has nine cores including three research projects on diabetes, obesity in children, and cervical cancer, and also includes several support cores - community outreach, bioinformatics training, and molecular studies.

Training local people in techniques of research that will allow them to look at their own health problems is particularly important, McCormick believes.

"I've worked all over the world in developing countries and poor populations. And this is an essential part of people moving beyond their poverty, and giving their young people an opportunity to participate in the great efforts of conducting research," he explains.