SPH45

Community Health Sciences: Now Is the Time.

Racism, the opioid crisis, maternal mortality, and health inequities—these are all issues that public health practitioners tackle every day. But where and how we live also profoundly impacts health. Community Health Science research provides comprehensive solutions to take on these big problems with the creation of public policy and implementation of community-level interventions.

The Boston University School of Public Health Department of Community Health Sciences (CHS) produces world-class scholarship and provides an outstanding educational experience for future public health leaders with a focus on health equity, advancing effective health policies, and strengthening community-based health practices.

“Our department is characterized by diversity of interests, methods, and topics of scholarly and community-based work,” says Richard Saitz, professor and chair of CHS. “Rather than focus on one science or one health topic, we use a range of methods and have deep expertise in numerous, specific health topics.

“Teaching is often practice-based and practical, mirroring the other scholarly work done, such as translating research to policy and practice,” he says.

The CHS department was created in 2009, merging the former SPH departments of Maternal and Child Health and Social and Behavioral Sciences.

Saitz, an addiction medicine specialist, became department chair in 2013. He is also a general internist and primary care physician at Boston Medical Center and a professor of general internal medicine at the School of Medicine.

One of the things about CHS that Saitz is most proud of is the way faculty and staff go above and beyond their duties. “Our community often gels around social justice issues, related to women’s health, racism, sexual minorities, and policies and communications related to health behaviors,” he says, so it’s no surprise that “grassroots efforts for students and local communities often arise and quickly take hold.”

The faculty have a wide array of scholarly expertise, including interests in improving the health and well-being of individuals, families, and communities; applying scientific theories and evidence to develop interventions and policies tailored to diverse communities; and broadening student understanding of the factors that shape community health.

The 22 primary CHS faculty publish 100-150 peer-reviewed papers per year and oversee over $10 million in externally funded projects from not only the National Institutes of Health (NIH) but also the Health Resources and Services Administration, the National Institute of Justice, the Robert Wood Johnson Foundation, the Patient Centered Outcomes Research Institute, the Department of Defense and Health Law Advocates, and more.

The BU Clinical Translational Science Institute (BU CTSI) is a $38 million effort led in part by CHS faculty. It provides support for translational research which includes translating, disseminating and implementing research and research findings in communities. The Institute engages with communities, provides methodological expertise and services for researchers, and training to help junior faculty advance. During COVID-19, the importance of their work has become even more essential, and because of this, BU CTSI recently received $38.3 million in renewal funding from the National Center for Advancing Translational Sciences (NCATS), part of the NIH. The renewal will help BU CTSI invest in coronavirus-related science, epidemiology, and clinical research, says Saitz.

“We are well-poised to help fund translational research in COVID-19 because we already have an infrastructure that expedites the ability of BU’s investigators to get moving on studies and identify patients to enroll in new clinical trials. We’ve made an enormous difference getting patients into [COVID-19-related] clinical trials.”

The National Institute on Drug Abuse (NIDA) supports investigations in the CHS department in the NIDA Clinical Trials Network (CTN). Two studies with national funding totaling $23 million are studying implementation of medication treatment for opioid use disorder in hospitals. “The reason this is critically important is that medications are the most effective treatment, they can reduce deaths, and they are rarely prescribed at hospital discharge even when the diagnosis is known,” Saitz says.

NIDA also supports department investigators as part of an $89 million award to Boston Medical Center to reduce opioid overdose mortality.

Department investigators are also currently studying topics including HIV pre-exposure prophylaxis (PrEP) implementation among people who inject drugs and among youth; dating and sexual violence; effectiveness of medications for alcohol use disorder; gun ownership and culture and health outcomes; and much more.

CHS faculty teach 40 courses and lead four Master of Public Health (MPH) certificates (Community Assessment, Program Design, Implementation, and Evaluation; Health Communication and Promotion; Maternal and Child Health; Mental Health and Substance Use), as well as dual degree, doctoral, and undergraduate public health training programs. Courses within these programs cover a range of public health issues, populations, methods, and frameworks.

CHS faculty are leaders in practice- and field-based education—two CHS courses were designed entirely around engaging student teams as consultants to community health organizations in Boston (and beyond). This approach has led to many international, national, university-wide, and school awards and recognition.

Even with all of these all of these accomplishments, Saitz and the CHS department are looking to the future. Comprehensive solutions to address things like obesity, poverty, or the unequal burden of the COVID-19 epidemic, are needed now more than ever. “We aspire to expand to lead major, community-based, externally-supported public health and research programs that incorporate and directly address health inequities and populations that have been marginalized,” he says.