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BY PAUL BONNER, The Herald-Sun
 

DURHAM — Black women are more likely than white women to get breast cancer, and more likely to die from it. Infant mortality rates are higher for blacks than whites or Hispanics. And the rate of HIV infection is more than 100 times higher among blacks in North Carolina than whites.

Those and other racially-based health disparities will be scrutinized by health care professionals and others June 12 at N.C. Central University.

The Health Disparities Conference will include presentations by researchers from NCCU, UNC and Shaw University.

"We really do want it to be an enrichment and a networking event, not just for us but for the community and service providers as well," said Walter Charles, an associate professor of psychology at NCCU and one of the conference’s organizers.

The session will begin at 8:30 a.m. at the School of Education auditorium at NCCU. There will be service exhibits available, and Charles said the conference will offer community organizers a chance to learn more about mobilizing people and educating them about health resources and disparity issues.

"We think the presentations will address illnesses that lots of people in the community suffer from," Charles said.

"Some of them may have been recent participants in some of these studies that are going to be described. It would certainly give them a different perspective on how their contributions are being used and recognized," he said.

Charles is a cognitive psychologist, a field that provides a mental model of diseases and their understanding that is rooted in behavior. That’s especially true of diseases like obesity which can be affected by diet, exercise and other lifestyle features, he said. (more…)

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