In Honor of Reverend Dr. James Brown: The SHARP Study: A Culturally Celebratory Approach to Black American Brain Health

October 14, 2021
12:00 pm to 1:00 pm
Online

Event sponsored by:

Department of Psychiatry and Behavioral Sciences
Department of Neurology
School of Medicine (SOM)

Contact:

Garrett, Angela

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Raina Croff, PhD

Speaker:

Raina Croff, PhD
In Honor of Reverend Dr. James Brown, a pioneer for making healthy life style approaches accessible to all people. Through his leadership, Reverend Dr. Brown, a long-standing adviser to Duke's Alzheimer's Research Program, demonstrated that it is possible to overcome many of the barriers to living a heart smart and brain healthy lifestyle. In 2007, through a partnership between Duke and his congregation at First Baptist Missionary Church, Reverend Dr. Brown began a ground-breaking program built on five of the six key pillars of brain health; and the congregation has been actively engaged to support one another in making positive lifestyle changes ever since. Raina Croff, PhD is Assistant Professor of Neurology at the NIA-Layton Aging and Alzheimer's Disease Center at Oregon Health & Science University, Neurology Diversity Committee Chair, and an American Academy of Neurology Diversity Leadership Program scholar. Her work focuses on the implications of gentrification on Black older adults' cognitive health and on increasing physical and social activity in ways that celebrate culture, history, and community memory. She received a PhD in Anthropology from Yale University in 2009. Dr. Croff brings her cultural training to qualitative health research, having collaborated on projects examining American Indian and Alaska Native traditional and evidence-based substance abuse treatment, older African American mindfulness, and African Americans' understanding of Alzheimer's Disease and barriers to healthier aging. Dr. Croff is Principal Investigator of the Sharing History through Active Reminiscence and Photo-imagery (SHARP) study, funded by the CDC Healthy Aging Program, the Alzheimer's Association, and the NIA. SHARP uses GPS-technology to engage older Black adults in walking conversational reminiscence, and provides oral history community deliverables and research opportunities for emerging Black scholars. More at www.sharpwalkingstudy.org. Finally, Dr. Croff is an avid forest enthusiast, mother, writer, and former archaeologist of the African Diaspora. Sponsored by the Ewald W.Busse Lectureship Link to join: https://duke.zoom.us/j/97565316379

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