Folakemi Odedina, MD

Prof. Folakemi Odedina is the Enterprise Deputy Director for Mayo Clinic Comprehensive Cancer Center Community Outreach & Engagement, Site Director for the Center for Health Equity and Community Engagement Research (CHCR) in Florida, and Director of CHCR Global Health Equity Program at Mayo Clinic. Also at Mayo Clinic, she is a member of the Mayo Clinical Trial Strategy and Governance Leadership team and leads the Community Engagement/Health Equity Clinical Trials Strategy. In addition, she is the PI and Founding Program Director of the NCI-EGRP supported Prostate Cancer Transatlantic Consortium (CaPTC), the Research Core Director for the Florida Health Equity Research Institute, and the Chair of the Research Committee for the African Organization for Research and Training in Cancer (AORTIC). For almost 30 years, her research, education, training and community outreach activities have exclusively focused on addressing health disparities in minority and underserved communities globally. Her research program (funded primarily by NIH/National Cancer Institute and Department of Defense) focuses on the predictors of cancer health disparities and cost-effective, community-based behavioral interventions to improve the health of minority populations, especially Black men globally. In 2005, her research program evolved into a global program that includes increasing participation of people of African ancestry in clinical trials. Through NIH/National Cancer Center awards, her research program has implemented Community Research Registry for Black and Latinx population, community education programs on clinical trials, clinical trials research training webinars and scientific conferences focused on clinical trials, including the Biennial Global Congress on Oncology Clinical Trials in Blacks. Prof. Odedina is personally and professionally committed to eliminating cancer disparities, especially in people of African ancestry.