Dr. Herman Taylor of Morehouse School of Medicine to receive the 2024 Clinical Research Prize

American Heart Association Scientific Sessions 2024

Embargoed until 7 a.m. CT/8 a.m. ET, Wednesday, Nov. 6, 2024

DALLAS, Nov. 6, 2024 - Herman A. Taylor Jr., M.D., M.P.H., FAHA, endowed professor and director of the Cardiovascular Research Institute at the Morehouse School of Medicine in Atlanta, will receive the Clinical Research Prize at the American Heart Association's Scientific Sessions 2024. The meeting, Nov. 16-18, 2024, in Chicago, is a premier global exchange of the latest scientific advancements, research and evidence-based clinical practice updates in cardiovascular science. Dr. Taylor will be awarded during the Presidential Session on Sunday, Nov. 17.

In addition to his roles at Morehouse School of Medicine, Dr. Taylor is also the director of player engagement and education and co-investigator in the Football Players Health Study at Harvard University. His research focuses on the advancement of health equity. Most notably, Dr. Taylor was the principal investigator and founding director of the Jackson Heart Study, a landmark study that continues today and has shaped cardiovascular care for more than the past 20 years. The Jackson Study focuses on heart health within Black communities, specifically exploring the genetic and environmental factors that influence heart disease for Black Americans. As an undergraduate at Princeton University, he had the opportunity to participate in a summer research fellowship designed to support college students from underrepresented racial and ethnic groups who are interested in medical school. This program introduced him to cardiovascular physiology and started his educational path to cardiology. When he learned of the vast differences in cardiovascular health related to race, he found his calling.

"It's my honor to present this award to Dr. Herman Taylor, whose passion for learning all that influences heart health across all populations is the type of work that moves medicine forward," said Keith Churchwell, M.D., FAHA, American Heart Association 2024-2025 volunteer president, associate clinical professor of medicine at Yale School of Medicine in New Haven, Connecticut, and adjunct associate professor of medicine at the Vanderbilt School of Medicine in Nashville, Tennessee. "Research that informs physicians on which influences have positive and negative patient outcomes is invaluable information when designing interventions that reduce risks and can lead to longer, healthier lives for more people."

Currently, Dr. Taylor is the director of the Morehouse-Emory Center for Health Equity (MECA) study that is investigating the determinants and characteristics of resilience related to heart disease among Black people in the U.S., exploring the individual and communal resilience, along with genetic and metabolic reasons for the resilience. The study hopes to uncover information that can be used when investigating new approaches to eliminate disparities, as well as used to assess the efficacy of interventions. Under his leadership, the MECA study enabled the training of six post-doctoral fellows who have since gone on to contribute to basic, clinical and translational scientific pursuits, as well as clinical practice. The study was originally funded by the Association as a part of its Strategically Focused Research program, and now continues with funding from the National Institutes of Health from under its National Heart, Lung and Blood Institute that focuses on sleep, as well as its National Human Genome Research Institute that is focusing on sociogenomics research and postdoctoral training in multiomics.

He is a co-investigator for the Harvard University Football Players Health Study, which is exploring the myriad of health conditions and concerns that impact the health and well-being of former NFL players throughout their lifetime. His work with Harvard's Football Player study then uses their discoveries to develop interventions to improve both physical and mental health and well-being. Additionally, Dr. Taylor is the principal investigator for the Morehouse Southeast Hub of the NIH Artificial Intelligence/Machine Learning Consortium to Advance Health Equity and Researcher Diversity (AIM-AHEAD) initiative to increase the number of under-represented minority scientists in artificial intelligence/machine learning, build data science capacity at under-resourced institutions and facilitate community involvement in the design of the AI that will impact our future. He and his team at Morehouse along with collaborators from the AIM-AHEAD consortium launched a national fellowship to train practicing clinicians in the use of clinically relevant and ethically sound artificial intelligence/machine learning.

"I'm deeply humbled by this award from the American Heart Association," said Dr. Taylor. "Heart health and disease result from the convergence of many factors. In my work, I try to look at the interplay between the broader social and physical environments that shape heart disease, and the individual characteristics that contribute to health outcomes in hopes of advancing a more precise understanding of health, one that accounts not only for risk factors like behavior, genetics and access to care, but also for resilience factors that can buffer against disease. Often these factors are deeply influenced by a social context often defined by race, which continues to shape both opportunities for health and barriers to care. I hope what we do moves the field forward towards true precision in prevention and care for the entire population. I'm grateful to the Association for this recognition of my work."

Dr. Taylor earned a bachelor's degree in biology from Princeton University, a medical degree from Harvard Medical School and a master's degree in public health from Harvard T.H. Chan School of Public Health. He completed an internship at Mount Auburn Hospital, a residency in internal medicine at the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill and a fellowship in interventional cardiology at the University of Alabama at Birmingham. He also served a three-year tour with the National Health Service Corps. He is board certified in both internal medicine and cardiovascular disease and is the author of more than 290 peer-reviewed journal articles. Dr. Taylor was previously honored by the Association with the Physician of the Year award in 2020.

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