CLINTRUSC Community Engagement & Outreach Core

CEO-Project Summary The overarching goal of the Clinical Engagement and Outreach (CEO) Core will be to provide a unified network of clinical sites throughout the South Carolina Midlands in which clinical and translational research can be performed. Through engaging expertise at the University of South Carolina in the colleges of medicine, public health, nursing, pharmacy and social work, the CEO will address how to overcome barriers in community engagement and patient recruitment. Specifically, these colleges contain programs in rural community engagement and links to rural health clinics (Federally Qualified Health Centers (FQHCs)). Prisma HealthCare System operates 17 primary care clinics within the Midlands, and based upon ZTCA mapping, many of these are located in areas which contain underrepresented populations- notably a very high Black population. The Columbia VA in addition to serving a large region of the Midlands in and of itself, also operates 3 Community Based Outpatient Based Clinics (CBOCs) within the Midlands. Accordingly, the overarching goal of the CEO Core will be to build upon the strengths which exist within USC and form an integrated network of health care clinics which will allow for clinical-translational research capacity within the Midlands and most importantly focus upon vulnerable patient populations; veterans and underrepresented patients.