Our Mission
The mission of the Black Men’s Health Project is to gain a deeper understanding of the unique health challenges of Black men and develop culturally competent strategies and solutions to improve the health outcomes for Black men.
The Black Men’s Health Project
is the largest and most comprehensive initiative of its kind in U.S. history.
Black Men are…
30
Black men are 30% more likely to die from heart disease
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Black men are 60% more likely to die from stroke than non-Hispanic white men
75
Black men are 75% less likely to have health insurance than white men
9
Black men are more than nine times more likely to die from AIDS
For too long, very little research and data
on the health of Black men has existed. The Black Men’s Health Project was created to call attention to the health crisis confronting African-American men in America and gather valuable data and insights through the Black Men’s Health Survey. Our findings will help identify strategies to address the racial disparities in health that negatively impact Black men across the country.
The Black Men’s Health Survey
A key component of the Black Men’s Health Survey is to collect valuable data about the health status and social experiences of Black men. Learning why and how certain factors contribute to the health disparities facing African American men is why a team of researchers from institutions including Johns Hopkins University, George Washington University and Michigan State University developed this survey.
HOW MANY PARTICIPANTS DO WE NEED?
10,000 Participants
The first step is to gain an accurate understanding of the state of Black men’s health. We are looking to survey 10,000 black males to have a significant sample size and gain in-depth perspectives on Black male health across the nation.
WHICH U.S. GEOGRAPHIES ARE ELIGIBLE?
NATIONWIDE
All black males in the United States ages 18 and older are eligible to complete the survey. Our goal is to include a diversity of Black men from across the country by education level, geographic location, and age.
EXPERTS BEHIND THE SURVEY
Who’s leading this initiative?
The Black Men’s Health Project is led by a coalition of Black male researchers who represent some of the leading institutions in America, including the Johns Hopkins University, George Washington University, and Michigan State University.
Click their photos to view their profiles.
Dr. Thomas LaVeist
Thomas A. LaVeist, Ph.D. is Chairman of the Department of Health Policy and Management at the George Washington University (GWU), Milken Institute School of Public Health. He joined GWU after 25 years on the faculty of the Johns Hopkins Bloomberg School of Public Health where he was the William C. and Nancy F. Richardson Professor in Health Policy and Director of the Hopkins Center for Health Disparities Solutions. He has published more than 125 scientific articles. In addition to his scholarly writing, Dr. LaVeist has written articles for Newsweek, Black Enterprise, and the Baltimore Sun.
Dr. LaVeist’s dissertation on racial disparities was awarded the Outstanding Dissertation Award by the American Sociological Association. He is the recipient of the “Innovation Award” from the National Institutes of Health, and the “Knowledge Award” from the DHHS, Office of Minority Health. In 2013 he was elected to National Academy of Medicine (formally Institute of Medicine).
Dr. Roland J. Thorpe, Jr.
Roland J. Thorpe, Jr., PhD, MS, is an Associate Professor in the Department of Health, Behavior, and Society, the Founding Director of the Program for Research on Men’s Health in the Hopkins Center for Health Disparities Solutions, and Deputy Director of the Hopkins Center for Health Disparities Solutions at the Johns Hopkins Bloomberg School of Public Health. Among other positions, he holds a joint appointment in the Johns Hopkins School of Medicine, Department of Medicine, Division of Geriatric Medicine and Gerontology, the Department of Neuroscience, and in the Undergraduate Program in Public Health Studies Program in the Johns Hopkins Krieger School of Arts & Sciences.
Dr. Thorpe is a social epidemiologist and gerontologist whose research agenda focuses on understanding how key social determinants of health such as race, socioeconomic status, and segregation affect health and functional outcomes among men across the life course. He serves as principal investigator of the Race Disparities in Mobility Disability Among Men Project, National Black Men’s Health Pilot Study, and the Black Men’s Health Accrual Project. His work appears in flagship journals including, Journals of Gerontology Medical Sciences, Social Science and Medicine, American Journal of Men’s Health, and International Journal of Men’s Health. In 2011, Dr. Thorpe was a recipient of the JHBSPH’s Advising, Mentoring, and Teaching Recognition Award for mentoring over 30 undergraduate, master, predoctoral, medical and postdoctoral students, publishing works with 10 of them.
Dr. Harold W. Neighbors
Dr. Harold “Woody” Neighbors recently transitioned from the University of Michigan (UM) to the Michigan State University (MSU) College of Human Medicine to become the second C.S. Mott Endowed Professor of Public Health. Dr. Neighbors has over 30 years of experience investigating the mental health of Black Americans. He was a graduate research assistant on the ground-breaking National Survey of Black Americans and a co-investigator on the National Survey of American Life (NSAL). In 2010, Dr. Neighbors and his colleagues conducted a large qualitative study titled Man Up Man Down. Findings from the first Man Up Man Down study confirmed that Black men are almost uniformly raised to think that they should “man up” whenever faced with stressful situations.
Dr. Neighbors has dedicated the bulk of his academic career to mentoring future generations of research scientists from diverse backgrounds and to helping them to conduct research on racial and ethnic health disparities. In 1988 he founded the University of Michigan School of Public Health’s (UMSPH) first diversity research program, the “Paul B. Cornely Postdoctoral Program for Minority Scholars.” Dr. Neighbors is a 2004 recipient of the RWJ Investigator Award in Health Policy Research where he explored policy solutions for reducing racial disparities in help-seeking and illness behavior.
Amazing institutions backing this initiative
Institutions
