Community voices: A photo documentary of health disparities in Roxbury

A photo essay documenting the persistent disparities in health status of the Roxbury neighborhood of Boston, in partnership with high school students from the Health Careers Academy (HCa) and Boston Area Health Education Center (BAHEC) and member artists of ACT Roxbury Consortium and the Roxbury Center for the Arts at Hibernian Hall. High school students from the partner programs were trained in qualitative research methods, specifically ‘photovoice', to document disparities in diseases such as diabetes, asthma and HIV/AIDS among the people served by three community health centers in the predominantly African-American and Latino neighborhood of Roxbury. The stories documenting challenges with access, discrimination, poverty, and all the social economic and political determinants of health make a compelling vehicle for increasing education and awareness in the community with regard to these issues.

A strong collaborative effort, the photo essay project brought together the expertise of the Center for Community Health Education Research and Service in community/public health in the neighborhoods of Boston, and the experience of the artists' collaborative of ACT Roxbury in working with young people on the publication the youth editions of the Roxbury Literary Annual, to build on the curriculum in health disparities developed by the students of HCa and BAHEC.

In Boston, where residents in public housing, patients of community health centers, and racial and ethnic minorities live in the shadows of the most prestigious medical institutions in the world, disparities in health of these vulnerable populations has taken front stage on the public health policy agenda.