On May 8^th, 2024, the Hispanic Alliance for Clinical and Translational Research (The Alliance) held its 13^th Scientific Day. This event, led by the Professional Development Core (PDC) of The Alliance, was part of the initiatives offered during the Puerto Rico Clinical and Translational Research Week (May 6^th to 12^th, 2024).

This year the theme for the plenary session was “Responding to Climate Change through Clinical and Translational Research”. We were delighted to have as keynote speakers two research experts on climate change who provided local and national perspectives on the topic.

Naresh Kumar, PhD is Director of the Climate and Health Graduate Program & Professor of Environmental and Biostatistics at, the University of Miami, FL. His presentation was titled: Climate and Health Research, Training and Community Outreach.

Pablo Méndez-Lázaro, PhD is an Associate Professor, at the Environmental Health Department, Graduate School of Public Health, at the University of Puerto Rico (UPR) – Medical Sciences Campus & Associate Investigator, at UPR Comprehensive Cancer Center. Dr. Méndez-Lázaro presentation was titled: Building Equitable Climate Adaptation in the US Caribbean.

 

The event continued with the historic showcasing of 54 scientific posters of students and investigators from diverse academic institutions and organizations. The posters were organized by research areas – Climate Change, Health Disparities, Chronic Disease Prevention, Emerging Infectious Diseases, Basic Sciences, Achievement of Healthy Lifestyles, and Community & Collaborations. See the complete list of the presented posters.   and the special supplement of the Puerto Rico Health Sciences Journal with the corresponding peer-reviewed abstracts.

 

 

Two investigators supported by The Alliance presented the results of their active projects. Dr. Edda I. Santiago-Rodríguez, investigator affiliated to the University of Puerto Rico, Medical Sciences Campus (UPR-MSC) and Pilot Project awardee 2022-2023, shared the results of her project titled “HIV and COVID in Puerto Rico Study”, and Dr. Polaris González (UPR-MSC), Alliance/ HiREC Small Grant awardee 2022-2023 presented the results of her project titled “The impact of COVID-19 positivity during pregnancy on Latinx/Hispanic maternal birth outcome”.

 

During the event, the following professionals and researchers were recognized:

Scientific Productivity:

• Vivian Colón López, PhD (UPR Comprehensive Cancer Center & UPR-MSC); Jorge Duconge Soler, PhD, MSc, BSc Pharm (UPR-MSC)

Outstanding Certified Mentors:

• Wilfredo De Jesús Monge, MD from Puerto Rico Consortium for Clinical Investigation (PRCCI) and Iris Martínez, DrPH from the Ponce Health Sciences University (PHSU)

  

  Dr. Wilfredo De Jesús Monge received a recognition as Outstanding Certified Mentor

  

  Dr. Iris Martinez received the recognition as Outstanding Certified Mentor

  
  

Outstanding Abstracts:

• Nancy Cardona, DrPH (UPR Comprehensive Cancer Center) – Category: Researcher/Faculty; Iris I. Sánchez-Lebrón, BS [Universidad Central del Caribe (UCC)] – Category: Student; Mariela Lugo Picó, MS (UPR-MSC) – Category: Other.

 

Special Distinction for his Contribution:

• Harol Saavedra, PhD (PHSU), co-leader of The Alliance PDC from 2020 to 2024.

 

We are thankful for the 179 in-person and 16 virtual (connected through Zoom) professionals who attended the morning sessions of the Scientific Day and hope it was an enriching one! They came from diverse institutions including universities, research consortiums, and clinical facilities throughout Puerto Rico. Services of Spanish to English translation and sign language interpretation were also provided to promote inclusivity.

During the afternoon of the 13^th Scientific Day, three concurrent sessions were held. The Alliance PDC and the Endowed Health Services Research Center (EHSRC) of the UPR-MSC hosted a workshop on “SAGE Research Methods”, an online research tool that provide access to scientific articles and guide users through their research process. The Alliance Community Engagement and Outreach (CoE) Core hosted a conference titled “Age Well Puerto Rico: Research on Vulnerable Elderly Populations in Puerto Rico”. The Biomedical Informatics, Bioinformatics and Cyberinfrastructure Enhancement Core (BiBEC) hosted a series of short workshops: 1) “AI and Data Science in Clinical Health Care”; 2) “The N3C Data Enclave: Updates and Coming Changes for Use”; and 3) “Accessing and Developing Clinical Research Using Large Data Sets:  Hispanic Collaborative Clinical Research Data Warehouse (HC2RDW) and TriNetX”. For further details click on the program.

  Special thanks to the Puerto Rico Consortium for Clinical Investigation (PRCCI) for the outstanding photos taken by their team on the 13th Scientific Day.