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About Us
Mississippi currently stands as the least healthy state in the U.S., plagued by alarmingly high rates of infant and maternal mortality and chronic disease. While pockets of improvement offer hope, the state still faces monumental structural and access issues. In 2016, the University of Mississippi Medical Center (UMMC) received a $19.8M phase I award from the National Institutes of Health (NIH) to support an Institutional Development Award (IDeA) Center of Biomedical Research Excellence. The IDeA program builds research capacity in states where levels of NIH research funding have historically been low by supporting basic, clinical, and translational research, faculty development, and infrastructure improvements. Now in its second phase and tenth year of funding, the Mississippi Center for Clinical and Translational Research (MCCTR) is a collaborative partnership between five institutions: the University of Mississippi Medical Center, Mississippi State University, Tougaloo College, the University of Mississippi, and the University of Southern Mississippi. The major focus of the MCCTR is to leverage an integrated clinical and translational (C/T) research program across UMMC and its partner institutions to address major chronic diseases (e.g., obesity, diabetes, CKD, hypertension, heart disease, cancer, maternal/fetal disorders, and dementia) impacting Mississippians.
The center is funded by the IDeA Program Infrastructure for Clinical and Translational Research grant through the National Institute of General Medical Sciences under the award number U54GM115428.
Mission
Our mission is to develop a powerful and sustainable research enterprise that will have an important public health impact on the citizens of Mississippi.
Goals of the MCCTR
The goals of the MCCTR are to (1) enhance infrastructure and people resources required to address the clinical and translational research needs in Mississippi; (2) increase focus on implementation science and clinical and behavioral interventions to address the health differences associated with cardiometabolic and obesity-related diseases in Mississippi; and (3) foster and coordinate collaboration in clinical and translational research among our partner institutions and within the national network of other academic centers dedicated to the same goals.
The MCCTR is intended as a hub that will increase the utilization of all research resources of the partner institutions to promote multi-institutional and multi-disciplinary clinical, translational, and community-engaged research projects.
Impact
Mississippi has major challenges in its healthcare delivery and health outcomes. Each year, United Health Foundation ranks each state’s health status using 35 different measures. In its 2019 rankings, Mississippi ranked worst at 50th overall. Within those 35 measures, Mississippi ranked worst in infant mortality, low birthright, children in poverty, clinical care, infectious disease, chronic kidney diseases, cardiovascular deaths, and Alzheimer deaths and “all determinants”. See figure.