WINSTON-SALEM, N.C. – Bryant Cameron Webb, a second-year student at Wake Forest University School of Medicine, has received a $5,000 David E. Satcher Research Fellowship from the Student National Medical Association (SNMA) to explore racial and ethnic health disparities in academic research.
“Cameron is an outstanding student and champion for reducing and eliminating health disparities,” said Ronny A. Bell, Ph.D., professor of epidemiology and prevention and director of the Maya Angelou Research Center on Minority Health at Wake Forest Baptist. “We are privileged to have him as part of our work here at the center.”
Webb will conduct his investigation under the direction of a team of mentors including Bell, Kristen G. Hairston, M.D., M.P.H, assistant professor of internal medicine-endocrinology and metabolism, and David L. Mount, Psy.D., M.A., assistant professor of internal medicine and a health disparities scholar through the National Institutes of Health National Center on Minority Health and Health Disparities.
He and other fellowship awardees will be honored during a luncheon at the 2008 Annual Medical Education Conference, March 21 in New York City. The research projects will be featured in the Journal of the SNMA and presented at the Annual Wilbert C. Jordan Research Forum at the 2009 Annual Medical Education Conference in New Orleans, La.
“This research touches on my interest in the intersection of health policy and legislation with the elimination of health disparities—both passions of mine,” said Webb. “Dr. Hairston helped craft the original idea for the research and has been invaluable in providing overall guidance on the project.
“The goal of the project is to translate the wealth of health disparities data into a tool for more effective creation and review of health policy and legislation. A variety of state health care intervention indicators, such as state health spending, Medicaid program analysis, state-sponsored health disparities legislation and the function of state minority health offices will be used as a composite of state efforts aimed at eliminating disparities,” he said.
Webb received the 2007 National Association of Medical Minority Educators Inc. scholarship award and serves as president of the class of 2010 at Wake Forest University School of Medicine. A native of Fredericksburg, Va., he graduated from the University of Virginia in 2005.
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Media Relations Contacts: Jim Steele, jsteele@wfubmc.edu, at (336) 716-3487, Bonnie Davis, bdavis@wfubmc.edu, at (336) 716-4977 or Shannon Koontz, shkoontz@wfubmc.edu, at (336) 716-2415.
Wake Forest University Baptist Medical Center is an academic health system comprised of North Carolina Baptist Hospital, Brenner Children’s Hospital and Wake Forest University Health Sciences, which operates the university’s School of Medicine and Piedmont Triad Research Park. The system comprises 1,154 acute care, rehabilitation and long-term care beds and has been ranked as one of “America’s Best Hospitals” by U.S. News & World Report since 1993. Wake Forest Baptist is ranked 32nd in the nation by America’s Top Doctors for the number of its doctors considered best by their peers. The institution ranks in the top third in funding by the National Institutes of Health and 4th in the Southeastern United States in revenues from its licensed intellectual property.