Center for Health Communication

By Mike Mackert

The fall semester is (somehow) almost over, which means a chance to look back on what happened in the last few months and see what needs to get done before the break. One thing that has particularly struck me is how I’ve had an increasing number of conversations lately where a primary benefit of the Center for Health Communication (CHC) is that it’s a “mile wide and a foot deep.”

By Mike Mackert

We’ve been working on a project related to the Texas Prescription Monitoring Program (PMP) for over a year now. The project is part of Texas’s efforts to combat the opioid epidemic, and we’re specifically focused on promoting use of the Texas PMP as a tool for prescribers to make appropriate prescribing decisions.

By Mike Mackert

From the first moment I heard about Bridging Barriers, UT’s grand challenge initiative, I was excited. The UT Center for Health Communication is built on interdisciplinary partnerships across campus, and being part of a Bridging Barriers project would be another way to make important connections across the university for my own research and on behalf of our center.

By Mike Mackert

One of my favorite lines of research revolves around how to better engage men in prenatal health promotion, and the exciting news is that our Father’s Playbook app has launched as a pilot.

By Mike Mackert

So much of the talk on any college campus, I think, is about how everyone – faculty, staff, and students – could do a better job collaborating across departments, fields, etc. Health communication is a field that in many ways requires interdisciplinary partnerships, but that fact has been very top of mind lately.

By Suzanne Burdick

Health literacy refers to the ability of people to “obtain, process, and act appropriately on health information. Many patients lack strong health literacy skills, and it can be more of a challenge to effectively “hand off” critical information to them.