# Brain CHEC-AC (Brain and Cognitive Health Equity Campaign for Allegheny County) > **NIH NIH U01** · UNIVERSITY OF PITTSBURGH AT PITTSBURGH · 2024 · $725,595 ## Abstract ABSTRACT Despite being at nearly twice the risk of developing Alzheimer’s or a related dementia (ADRD), Americans identifying as Black or African American are 35% less likely to be diagnosed with ADRD than their White counterparts. This marked disparity in dementia detection and diagnosis has corresponding implications for delays in the initiation and continuation of treatment. Intervening to eradicate this disparity is a public health imperative as the field of ADRD care is on the precipice of a sea change due to newly available disease modifying therapies. These therapies require testing to confirm the presence of amyloid accumulation, and they must be initiated in the early stages of cognitive impairment. Under the current paradigm, the vast majority of African Americans adults for whom these new therapies may be appropriate will be diagnosed too late for their administration. This proposal recognizes that structural factors shaping daily life, like societal stigma around brain health disorders, and experiences of discrimination in medical settings, contribute profoundly to disparities in ADRD detection among African American adults and require multilevel intervention to be dismantled. In response to NIH RFA-NR-24-004, Transformative Research to Address Health Disparities and Advance Health Equity, the long-term goal of this project is to address existing, and intercept a worsening of, disparities in early detection and diagnosis of ADRD. To achieve our goal, we will carry out three primary objectives in partnership with the Black Equity Coalition and the Allegheny County Health Department. Using the Culture-Centric Model of Health Promotion, in Objective/Aim 1 we will elicit and prioritize the voices of African American adults who are directly impacted by late-life cognitive health disparities to create stakeholder-endorsed brain health narrative campaign materials for deployment over multimedia platforms. In Objective/Aim 2, we will use the materials developed in Aim 1 to deploy a community-focused brain health narrative campaign to combat stigma around brain health disorders in the places where African American adults at risk for ADRD live, work, shop, and play. In Objective/Aim 3, we will assess the feasibility and acceptability of bringing state of the science AD blood- based biomarker testing infrastructure to the places where African Americans at highest risk for ADRD live, work, shop, and play. By targeting social norms and societal level forces like stigma, this proposal addresses challenges at the NIMHD-defined community and societal levels, while, in the final aim building community- based infrastructure for addressing a health disparity at the individual level. This approach begins by drawing upon cultural capital in the form of community members’ stories that demonstrate the value of preserving brain health or offer counternarratives about maintaining dignity through dementia. In full circle, these stories become culturally salien... ## Key facts - **NIH application ID:** 11060195 - **Project number:** 1U01NS141777-01 - **Recipient organization:** UNIVERSITY OF PITTSBURGH AT PITTSBURGH - **Principal Investigator:** JENNIFER Hagerty LINGLER - **Activity code:** U01 (R01, R21, SBIR, etc.) - **Funding institute:** NIH - **Fiscal year:** 2024 - **Award amount:** $725,595 - **Award type:** 1 - **Project period:** 2024-09-20 → 2029-08-31 ## Primary source NIH RePORTER: https://reporter.nih.gov/project-details/11060195 ## Citation > US National Institutes of Health, RePORTER application 11060195, Brain CHEC-AC (Brain and Cognitive Health Equity Campaign for Allegheny County) (1U01NS141777-01). Retrieved via AI Analytics 2026-05-23 from https://api.ai-analytics.org/grant/nih/11060195. Licensed CC0. --- *[NIH grants dataset](/datasets/nih-grants) · CC0 1.0*