The field of public health addresses a wide range of issues, making it a natural for interdisciplinary collaboration. UCLA faculty members and students reach beyond traditional academic boundaries to promote cooperative exchange across disciplines. The following interdisciplinary centers are sponsored by or associated with the Fielding School of Public Health.
The Biobehavioral Assessment and Research Center (BARC) promotes research on high impact science that the National Institute of Health (NIH) has identified as high-priority areas of public health research. With a team of multidisciplinary investigators, BARC utilizes and develops innovative biobehavioral and technological approaches that integrate behavioral measures/markers into intervention studies, prevention trials, and clinical science. BARC also supports incorporation of clinical and basic biomarkers into behavioral research and prevention science.
The Bixby Center on Population and Reproductive Health was established in 2001 at the UCLA Fielding School of Public Health as the result of a generous gift from the Fred H. Bixby Foundation. The center has grown since then with the support from additional Bixby Foundation gifts. The center promotes and supports research, training, and applied public health in the areas of population, reproductive health, and family planning. The principal focus of the program is on reproductive health issues in developing countries, where population growth rates remain high and reproductive health services are poor or inaccessible. However, the Bixby Center also works in reproductive health-related issues in the U.S.
The Center for Cancer Prevention and Control Research is a joint program of the Fielding School and the Geffen School of Medicine’s Jonsson Comprehensive Cancer Center. Since its inception in 1976, the center has been nationally and internationally recognized in Los Angeles community, nationally, and internationally. It conducts rigorous peer-reviewed research in three major program areas—the Healthy and At-Risk Populations Program, the Molecular Epidemiology Program, and the Patients and Survivors Program.
The Healthy and At-Risk Populations Program focuses on the prevention and early detection aspects of the cancer control continuum. The program’s research portfolio encompasses a broad range of studies including investigations in tobacco control, nutrition, physical activity, breast, cervix, prostate and colorectal cancer screening, control of vaccine preventable cancers (liver, cervix), as well as expanding interests in economic and community level factors as predictors of cancer related outcomes. A central theme characterizing this program is a major emphasis on cancer disparities research—bringing cancer prevention and control to low-income, minority, and other socially and medically underserved populations locally, nationally, and internationally. The Patients and Survivors Program has as its major goal the reduction in avoidable morbidity and mortality among patients with cancer, long-term survivors of cancer. The two main scientific thrusts of the program are: quality-of-life outcomes along the developmental phases of the lifespan continuum (e.g., children, young adult survivors, adult cancer patients and survivors, elderly cancer patients and survivors), including late medical and psychosocial effects; and quality of cancer care, its measurement, and evaluation. The program also houses the UCLA-LIVESTRONG Survivorship Center of Excellence and the UCLA Family Cancer Registry. The Molecular Epidemiology Program focuses on: primary prevention: examining environmental exposure (smoking, diet, infection, air pollution, etc.) and genetic susceptibility and cancer risk, as well as exploring gene-environmental interactions in cancer risk; secondary prevention: evaluating biological markers (somatic mutations and hyper-methylations of tumor suppressor genes and oncogenes, gene copy numbers, etc.) for early detection, as well as intermediate markers as surrogate end-points for chemoprevention; and tertiary prevention: assessing blood and tissue-based biological markers (tumor markers, single nucleotide polymorphisms, etc.) for cancer prognosis and survival prediction.
The last several years have seen major transformations in global public health, requiring significant expansion and reconstruction of the international public health work force. Many emerging health problems require timely and sustained research efforts and require application of the best scientific knowledge and focused training for the global public health work force.
The UCLA Center for Global and Immigrant Health was established in 2008. The center includes faculty from all of the departments in the Fielding School of Public Health as well as the schools of medicine, dentistry, and nursing, and the California Center for Population Research, all of whom have research or teaching interests in global and/or immigrant health. Participating faculty have active research collaborations in more than 50 countries throughout the world, and several work both with immigrant communities in California and in the countries of origin of these communities. The center offers a Certificate in Global Health available to students in any UCLA degree-granting graduate and professional program.
The UCLA Center for Health Advancement provides enhanced analysis and evidence-based information to help policymakers decide which policies and programs can best improve health and reduce health disparities. The center analyzes a wide range of timely health improvement opportunities, identifying those supported by strong evidence. It presents and disseminates the results of these analyses in plain language to those who make and influence public- and private-sector policies and programs, and offers training and technical assistance to facilitate implementation of recommended approaches.
The center brings together faculty from multiple departments of the Fielding School and other UCLA schools with a wide range of subject matter and methodological expertise, including expertise in nonhealth sectors such as education, transportation, housing, environmental protection, community planning, agriculture, public welfare, and economics. It has strong collaborations with government public health agencies, foundations, academic institutions, and other not-for-profit organizations. Within the health sector, its work is focused on how alternative investments to wasteful expenditures in health care can yield greater returns.
The UCLA Center for Health Policy Research is one of the nation’s leading health policy research centers and the premier source of health policy information for California. Established in 1994, the center is based in the Fielding School of Public Health and affiliated with the Luskin School of Public Affairs. The center improves the public’s health by advancing health policy through research, public service, community partnership, and education. It is particularly known for its programs on health insurance, health economics, health disparities, and chronic disease. The center also conducts the California Health Interview Survey (CHIS), the nation’s largest state health survey.
The Center for Healthcare Management brings together academic researchers, students, seasoned executives, practitioners, and other health experts, as well as interdisciplinary academic health care management resources to advance health care management. The center is committed to accomplish its mission to unite, inspire, and enrich interdisciplinary leadership that progresses health care management. The center’s vision is to be the builder of strong and intertwined relationships with members of the Southern California health-care management community, to be the home of interdisciplinary academic health-care management resources from across the UCLA campus for students and faculty, and to be the brand of health-care management for the Fielding School’s Department of Health Policy and Management, and its UCLA partners. The center aims to accomplish its mission and vision by pulling together the best minds from UCLA and from the broader community to improve the current state of applied research, knowledge, and practice; jointly exploring critical issues in the management of health care organizations; providing an academic home for leaders in the field to contribute career experience and mentorship; producing research that influences management practices and seeks on-the-ground health care management expertise to inform research questions; and creating a library of health care management cases, generated internally and fielded from outside UCLA, as a repository for internal use and external licensing.
The Center for Healthier Children, Families, and Communities (CHCFC) was established in 1995 to address some of the most challenging health and social problems facing children and families. The center’s mission is to improve society’s ability to provide children with the best opportunities for health and well-being, and the chance to assume productive roles within families and communities.
Through a unique interdisciplinary partnership—between UCLA departments including Psychology; schools including education, law, medicine, nursing, public affairs, and public health; and providers, community agencies, and affiliated institutions—a critical mass of expertise has been assembled. This allows CHCFC to conduct activities in five major areas: child health and social services; applied research; health and social service provider training; public policy research and analysis; and technical assistance and support to community providers, agencies, and policymakers.
The UCLA Center for Healthy Climate Solutions (C-Solutions) focuses on protecting people and communities from the effects of climate change. The center equips decision makers with solutions that reduce inequities and benefit their economy, environment, and health. With their partners, the center uses evidence-based best practices that improve health and resilience, now and for generations to come. Under the leadership of Dr. Jonathan Fielding and Professor Michael Jerrett, the C-Solutions team provides public health expertise to help communities put leading research and best practices to work. The center works with communities to implement solutions that provide health, economic, and environmental benefits. The center prioritizes those with highest need to help reduce health disparities and promote climate justice. C-Solutions works with local stakeholders, conduct in-depth interviews with policy leaders, and share their findings with partner communities. Through these methods, the center is fortifying its collective ability to adapt and respond to the dangers of climate change.
The UCLA Center for LGBTQ Advocacy, Research and Health, or C-LARAH (LARAH is derived from the Latin word hilaris, meaning cheerful), is dedicated to improving the health and well-being of sexual and gender minorities, and is committed to sharing expertise in public health, including epidemiological methods, developing and testing biobehavioral interventions, education and research training, program design and analysis, health policy initiatives, and implementation science with community based organizations and academic institutions. In addition, C-LARAH is devoted to recruiting and training a community of diverse scholars from underrepresented minority groups and fostering a welcoming, inclusive, and intellectually-enriching environment where all students, postdocs, staff, and faculty feel supported and can achieve their full potential. The center works directly with members of the lesbian, gay, bisexual, transgender, and queer (LGBTQ) community, and is able to draw upon expansive local and national relationships with state and local public health departments, academic researchers, health-care providers, community-based organizations, consumer groups, advocacy foundations, and funding agencies. Its familiarity and experience working with the LGBTQ community and allied organizations well-equips it to inform policymakers of the most effectual ways to reach members of this historically marginalized population and how to serve them holistically through all social determinants of health and justice.
Established by the California Legislature and Executive Branch in 1978, Center for Occupational and Environmental Health (COEH) is one of three state-funded programs for research, training, and service in the area of occupational and environmental health.
COEH faculty from public health, nursing, and medicine train occupational and environmental health professionals and scientists, conduct research, and provide services through consultation, education, and outreach. Programs include environmental chemistry, occupational/environmental epidemiology, occupational ergonomics, industrial hygiene, occupational/environmental medicine, occupational/environmental health nursing, toxicology, gene-environment interactions, psychosocial factors in the work environment, and occupational health education.
The Center for Public Health and Disasters was established in 1997 to address critical issues faced when a disaster impacts a community. The center promotes interdisciplinary efforts to reduce the health impacts of domestic, international, natural, and human-induced disasters. It facilitates dialog between public health and medicine, engineering, physical and social sciences, and emergency management. This unique philosophy is applied to the education and training of practitioners and researchers, collaborative interdisciplinary research, and service to the community. The multidisciplinary center staff and participating faculty members have backgrounds that include emergency medicine, environmental health sciences, epidemiology, gerontology, health services, social work, sociology, urban planning, and public health.
The center is one of 15 Academic Centers for Public Health Preparedness funded by the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention. The goal of these national centers is to improve competencies of front-line workers in public health to respond to public health threats.
The Center for the Study of Racism, Social Justice, and Health is a multidisciplinary, collaborative research center housed in the Community Health Sciences Department leading the nation in conducting rigorous, community-engaged research to identify, investigate, and explain how racism and other social inequalities may influence the health of diverse local, national, and global populations.
The center is distinguished from other disparities-related research units at UCLA by its primary focus on the health implications of racism for diverse populations. Public health is both an academic discipline and an applied one. Therefore, the center encourages the translation of research findings for use by public health professionals, community organizations, and policy makers in their ongoing health equity efforts. Many center affiliates are working to identify, investigate, and explain the specific mechanisms by which various forms of racism may produce local, national, or global health inequities. Others are advancing critical racial theories or building community partnerships to guide their anti-racism, health-equity work. The center supports a community of scholars engaged in cutting-edge research, scholarship, public health practice, and community engagement to tackle questions such as how racism affects the physical and mental health of diverse populations, what tools are available to improve the rigor with which researchers study racism and its relationship to health inequities, which intervention strategies most effectively address contribution of racism to specific health inequities, and what are effective ways to teach public health students about racism. Affiliates represent disciplines of public health, history, medicine, urban planning, sociology, and other areas.
The characteristics of the Southern California NIOSH Education and Research Center (ERC) are embodied in a coordinated, interdisciplinary set of professional education, continuing education, research, and outreach activities that positively impact the region's and nation's occupational health and safety practice. The center has seven programs, five at UCLA, one at UC Irvine, and two center-wide programs. The UCLA programs are Industrial Hygiene, Occupational and Environmental Health Nursing, Center Administration and Planning, Continuing Education, and Outreach. UC Irvine hosts the Occupational Medicine program. The center-wide programs are the Pilot Project Research Training and Targeted Research Training Programs. Degrees offered by ERC programs include the Doctor of Philosophy, Doctor of Public Health, Master of Public Health, Master of Science, Master of Science in Nursing, and residency certificates.
The ERC operates with the UCLA and UC Irvine Centers for Occupational and Environmental Health (COEH). These are state-supported centers for research and teaching in occupational safety and health. Together the ERC and COEH represent a unique and effective partnership between state and federal funding.
The UCLA Kaiser Permanente Center for Health Equity (formerly the Center to Eliminate Health Disparities) was established in 2004 to address the increasing disparities in health status and health care in the U.S. The center conducts community-based participatory intervention research in health promotion and disease prevention to mitigate disparities. The center also facilitates community and academic partnerships in research, trains future leaders in health disparities research, provides technical assistance for implementing evidence-based programs that build on community needs and existing assets, and hosts annual community symposia on critical public health issues.
This center without walls includes members from academia, government, and private/non-profit organizations to enable more effective collaboration with community partners to reduce health disparities across the lifespan. For more information, see Kaiser Permanente Center for Health Equity.
The WORLD Policy Analysis Center (WORLD) aims to strengthen equal rights and opportunities worldwide by identifying the most effective policy approaches for both improving individual well-being and health and enabling countries to thrive socially and economically; improving the quantity and quality of comparative data available to policymakers, citizens, civil society, and researchers around the world on policies affecting human health, development, well-being, and equity; and working in partnerships to support evidence-based improvements in communities and countries worldwide.
The WORLD Policy Analysis Center engages in a rigorous research process to gather and transform massive quantities of legal and policy data into the quantifiable, accessible, user-friendly resources including interactive maps, tables, and downloadable datasets. With an international, multilingual, and multidisciplinary team, WORLD works to carefully select and analyze the best global sources of information to minimize errors. In addition, WORLD analyzes this data to identify effective policies and laws, publish original research, and offer evidence-based policy recommendations. Through partnerships with organizations around the globe, WORLD aims to translate its global policy data into community- and country-level improvements.
