Diverse Populations
Dr. Aileen Aldalur studies mental health promotion and suicide prevention in Deaf adults, including developing and testing behavioral interventions developed for—and delivered in—American Sign Language. Rochester, NY has the Rochester has the largest per capita Deaf community in the U.S., making it an ideal environment for this work. She is Director of Research in UR Medicine’s Deaf Wellness Center (DWC), a program of the University of Rochester Medical Center, based in its Department of Psychiatry. The DWC staff engage in clinical services, teaching, and research activities that pertain to mental health, healthcare, sign language interpreting, and other topics that affect the lives of people who are deaf or hard-of-hearing.
Dr. Caroline Silva studies behavioral interventions to address suicide risk in Hispanic/Latino adults, including those who are primary Spanish speakers. Her work engages with the Spanish Language outpatient psychiatry clinic at UR Medicine, Lazos Fuertes.
Dr. Arielle Sheftall studies studies suicide prevention in Black youth. She investigates the links between developmental risk factors, such as neurocognitive functioning, familial relationships, and suicidal thoughts and behaviors (STBs) in youth. You can read more about her work in the URMC Newsroom article The Power of Prevention.
While most of our investigators are based in Rochester, NY, CSPS investigators have long understood the need to consider cultural, geographic, linguistic, and socioeconomic factors in suicide prevention. The CSPS has a long history of collaborations with researchers globally, including those throughout China, and in supporting the academic career development of suicide prevention researchers around the world. The China-Rochester Suicide Research Center was supported by a grant from the John E. Fogarty International Center for Advanced Study in the Health Sciences and provided a training program for talented individuals to participate in interdisciplinary research teams to study suicide attempts and deaths in Hong Kong and China. This Center produced numerous publications on suicide ideation, attempts, and deaths in Hong Kong and China.