Research
West Texas' changing demographics, population diversity, workforce issues, and geographic features with relative isolation from the remainder of the country create a complex environment of numerous interrelated factors affecting health status and the delivery of health care. West Texas' circumstances offer stark illustrations of three leading determinants of health disparities (low socioeconomic status, ethnicity, and geographic isolation) and of three conspicuous manifestations of health disparities (obesity and its associated health effects, cancer, and exposure to environmental toxins) that lend themselves to interventions.
Although Texas Tech University Health Sciences Center scientists are involved in a broad range of research endeavors, the institution has focused significant research efforts on studying the effects of rurality as a determinant of health as well as the risk factors and diseases that particularly affect the region's population-obesity and its health consequences, and aging and dementia.
Some of the key projects include the West Texas Atlas of Rural and Community Health, a study on the influence and dynamics of spirituality on health, analysis of 15 years of body mass index and other health-related data for school children, and the completion of the National Institutes' of Health funded West Texas EXPORT (Excellence in Partnerships for Community Outreach, Research on Health Disparities and Training) Center project.