HJNO Jan/Feb 2024

HEALTHCARE JOURNAL OF NEW ORLEANS I  JAN / FEB 2024 41 For weekly eNews updates and to read the journal online, visit HealthcareJournalNO.com common, especially in our patients with heart disease,” explained Nair. “This new technology allows us to more effectively treat a wide range of blockages from the ankle to the hip to save limbs, and ultimately our patients’ lives and the quality of those lives.” DCHC's Family and Social Medicine Residency Program Receives Accreditation DePaul Community Health Centers’ (DCHC) Family and Social Medicine Residency Program recently garnered accreditation from the Accred- itation Council for Graduate Medical Education (ACGME). The program, which is patient-cen- tered and tailored to each resident, focuses on delivering the highest level of primary care and offers a rich environment to learn and address all elements of care. The ACGME accreditation comes after months of the Family and Social Medicine Residency team working diligently to ensure the program meets requirements set within clinical learning environments to support the developmental skills, knowledge, and attitudes of future physi- cians. The program also facilitates an environ- ment where residents can interact with patients under the guidance and supervision of highly qualified physicians. “I’m beyond proud of the level of profession- alism and experience that DePaul Community Health Centers’ Family and Social Medicine Res- idency Program will provide participants,” said DCHC CEO and President Michael Griffin, MSPH, DSc, FACHC. “The curriculum is designed to be innovative and comprehensive in a way that enables residents to personalize parts of their training. Most importantly, it speaks to DePaul’s passion for supporting and inspiring the next generation of community health care profession- als by offering invaluable learning experiences.” DCHC’s Family and Social Medicine Residency Program began interviews with prospective res- idents in November 2023, and the program will begin July 1, 2024. Bogalusa Heart Study Recognizes 50 Years of Pioneering Research Fifty years ago, in the fall of 1973, a land- mark study began in the rural Louisiana town of Bogalusa that would change how the world sees heart disease. The Bogalusa Heart Study, which tracked the health of the town’s children into adulthood, found for the first time that heart disease begins in childhood. The community-wide study pioneered a new approach to pediatrics by proving that high blood pressure and high cholesterol in children doesn’t fade with age without intervention and could result in hypertension and heart disease later in life. One of the longest-running biracial health studies in the world, it was also one of the first to identify race-based health disparities between Black and White participants. “This study had a global impact on healthcare and left a tremendous public health legacy,” said Lydia Bazzano, principal investigator of the Bog- alusa Heart Study and director of the Center for Lifespan Epidemiology Research at Tulane Uni- versity School of Public Health and Tropical Med- icine. “There’s never going to be a clinical trial that proves that childhood intervention results in improvements 40-50 years later. This is the best evidence we have, and I don’t know if there will ever be another study like this.” This fall, Tulane University is celebrating 50 years of groundbreaking research by the Boga- lusa Heart Study, while also looking ahead to what the study’s next 50 years can achieve. The Bogalusa Heart Study — in collaboration with researchers from LSU’s Pennington Biomedi- cal Research Center and Mary Bird Perkins Cancer Center — received a $14.5 million grant from the National Institute on Aging in 2019 to investigate whether high blood sugar levels in early life can later lead to declines in brain health. With a now middle-aged cohort of participants, Bazzano said she believes Bogalusa “can do the same thing for brain health in the next 50 years that we did for heart health in the last 50.” “It all starts with the heart,” Bazzano said. “The brain is one of the first stops for blood that comes from the heart, so it made sense to look at how vascular aging impacts the brain.” Early results indicate that participants who per- form worse on neuropsychological testing pre- viously showed more heart disease risk factors. Brain scans of middle-aged participants also revealed white brain lesions on those who, as young adults, had slightly elevated blood sugar levels. These lesions, called white matter hyperin- tensities, indicate not enough oxygen and nutri- ents are reaching the smallest blood vessels in the brain and are associated with cognitive decline. Researchers are also working to identify blood biomarkers of dementia in the hopes of one day being able to identify risk of dementia via a blood test. “Just as childhood was not thought of as a time when heart disease would start, early middle age is not seen as time when dementia might origi- nate,” Bazzano said. “This could have a revolu- tionary effect on the field.” The Bogalusa Heart Study has included more than 16,000 participants since it was started by pediatric cardiologist and Tulane University grad- uate Gerald Berenson, MD. The data collected continues to be vital to research around nutrition, childhood obesity, and genetic risk factors. While the longevity of the Bogalusa Heart Study can be partly attributed to the dedication of its researchers, the study’s historic streak may have ended long ago without its deep roots in the community. Joe Culpepper, a native and former police chief of Bogalusa, was 11 years old when he and 5,000 children first began receiving health screenings in 1973. A long white trailer of lab equipment pulled up to his elementary school. Researchers orga- nized students into groups with bracelets of col- ored yarn. Blood pressure was checked. Weight was measured. Blood was drawn. The checkups continued as years went on, but Culpepper had no idea that the findings of the study would have global implications. “I still go to get tests done. One of my broth- ers is still actively participating. Friends in Baton Rouge occasionally come back to Bogalusa to participate, and my sister-in-law now manages the lab,” Culpepper said. “We’re all proud of the study, and the medical knowledge gained from studying folks like me our whole lives hopefully makes things better for the kids coming up.” At the Bogalusa Heart Study lab, two current employees are former participants in the study. Another, Phylis Cothern, has been a lab technician for 10 years, but before her, her mother began working for the study in 1972, when the pilot was underway. Now, Cothern’s two daughters and her