Global Health Nexus, Winter 2004

RAAHPer of the Year Award Presented to Dr. Augustus Elias of the University of Puerto Rico

Dr. Augustus Elias, Director of Research at the University of Puerto Rico School of Dentistry, has won the 2003 RAAHPer of the Year Award, presented annually by the NYU Oral Cancer Research for Adolescent and Adult Health Promotion (RAAHP) Center to the individual who has excelled in RAAHP Center activities during the preceding year. The RAAHP Center was established in 2001, with a seven-year, $8.3 million grant from the NIH to investigate why African Americans and Hispanics have a higher incidence of oral cancer and higher mortality rates from oral cancer than other groups.

The award was presented at the RAAHP Center’s annual banquet for the External Advisory Board, a dinner preceding a two-day working meeting which reviewed the progress of the NYU Oral Cancer RAAHP Center to date, and this year also featured guest speakers on oral cancer from India and Sri Lanka/England, as well as from the NYU School of Medicine’s Center for Immigrant Health.

In presenting the award to Dr. Elias, Dr. Ralph V. Katz, Director of the RAAHP Center and Professor and Chairman of the Department of Epidemiology & Health Promotion, said: “Dr. Elias’s vision, scientific interests, and administrative diligence not only have made the University of Puerto Rico our major partner in the RAAHP Center, they have also been central in making our RAAHP Center a reality for all 48 participants at the 15 collaborating universities and agencies. Simply put, without Dr. Elias there would not have been, could not have been, an NYU Oral Cancer RAAHP Center. Tonight we thank him, and honor him.”