News

Register today for the 2009 American Indian/Alaska Native Health Policy Conference - "Healthcare Reform: Opportunities in Indian Country” to be held October 22-23, 2009 at the Hilton Albuquerque in Albuquerque, NM. This two-day conference is designed to provide a national audience with anoverview of key American Indian health policy issues that impact access to healthcare services, quality of care and health disparities. Hosted by the Robert Wood Johnson Foundation Center for Health Policy at the University of New Mexico and the Center for Native American Health at the University of New Mexico, the conference is open to the public and is free of charge. Advance registration is required by October 12,2009.

he Robert Wood Johnson Foundation Doctor of Philosophy in Nursing with a Concentration in Health Policy Program and the UNM College of Nursing is pleased to announce the selection of three new students to the doctoral nursing fellowship program. The following were selected for the 2009-2010 fellowship awards:

Sally S. Cohen, Ph.D., R.N., F.A.A.N., has recently joined the faculty of the Robert Wood Johnson Foundation Doctor of Philosophy in Nursing with a Concentration in Health Policy Program at the University of New Mexico. Cohen serves as an associate professor of Nursing in the UNM College of Nursing and a senior fellow at the Robert Wood Johnson Foundation Center for Health Policy at UNM.

The Robert Wood Johnson Foundation Center for Health Policy at the University of New Mexico is pleased to announce the opening of: Recent Work from the Arid Southwest, a photo exhibit by John A. Trotter, PhD.    The exhibit, featuring photos from California's Death Valley National Park and New Mexico's White Sands National Monument, opens this week with a reception on Thursday, September 3, 2009, from 5-7 pm and will run through December at the Center.

The Robert Wood Johnson Foundation Center for Health Policy at the University of New Mexico, the only health policy center dedicated to increasing the number of health policy experts from Latino and American Indian communities across the nation, has selected eight new fellows for the 2009-2010 academic year. In keeping with the program's commitment of selecting scholars from across the country from the social science fields including, political science, economics, sociology, anthropology, psychology journalism, and from the clinical sciences in nursing this year's fellows include:

Registration is now open for the Ninth Annual Binational Policy Forum on Migration and Health to be held on October 5-6, 2009 at the Hilton Santa Fe Resort at Buffalo Thunder in Santa Fe, New Mexico. More than 300 high-level representatives from federal, state, academic and community organizations from the United States, Mexico, Canada, South and Central American countries are expected to attend. Visit https://www.regonline.com/binationalpolicy for online registration, media registration and detailed meeting logistics. This two-day event is hosted by the State of New Mexico and the Robert Wood Johnson Foundation Center for Health Policy at the University of New Mexico.

Each year, the BHW Steering Committee commissions a commemorative mural to be exhibited during BHW events held in each participating region. The mural selected for this year is titled Bountiful Earth and it was created by New Mexican artist Edward Gonzales. It was selected to commemorate the Ninth Annual Binational Policy Forum on Migration and Health, to be held in Santa Fe, New Mexico.

Click on the news release hyperlink above for a press release from the June 2009 National Congress of American Indians Conference. Included in the releases are details from a forum where participants released the findings of a seven-year historical trauma study.   In sessions lead by RWJF Senior Fellow Dr. Tassie Parker, many tribal representatives stood up and publicly thanked the Seneca Nation for leading this research effort and for the methods used, and requested assistance in doing the same in their communities. The NCAI recognized the work as cutting-edge in Indian Country as it was one of only 4 (out of 35 applicants) selected for presentation before tribal leaders nationally. This is the type of work that will reduce health disparities better than any other approach.  

Valdez and Nina Wallerstein, Ph.D., M.P.H., addressed the NIH-produced Summit on the Science of Eliminating Health Disparities, which examined the intersection of science practice and policy, held December 16 to 18, 2008. Valdez provided the opening scientific keynote address in which he discussed that “Health disparities really mean that many American Indians die young, African Americans die five years earlier than Whites, and that Latinos often die after painful and disabling disease.”  He advocated that progressive social policies can reduce these inequities and improve the health of the public. Wallerstein, director of the UNM Center for Participatory Research, Institute of Public Health, gave a presentation encouraging the utilization of Community-Based Participatory Research as a strategy in developing interventions to reduce health disparities.  Her presentation provided details from her research experiences in working with American Indian communities in New Mexico.

Established in 2007, the Robert Wood Johnson Foundation (RWJF) Center for Health Policy at the University of New Mexico is a physical, educational and cultural home for promising health policy scholars and researchers from underrepresented groups and disadvantaged backgrounds. The Center provides training, research experience and other opportunities that enable participants to inform discussions and debates about health policy.  “Over the past two years, the Center has made considerable strides in identifying and developing scholars from the Latino and American Indian communities who are working collaboratively to shape policy solutions to our most pressing health problems. These scholars and researchers and their ideas are critical to addressing our changing health problems" said Robert O. Valdez, Ph.D., M.H.S.A., executive director of the RWJF Center for Health Policy.”

Here are a few highlights of the Center’s work: