Newly inducted NBA Hall of Fame member Charles Barkley is supporting the UAB Minority Health and Research Center (MHRC) efforts to reduce racial and ethnic health disparities in Alabama.

Barkley, now a basketball commentator for TNT network, will host the center’s annual benefit gala, a $150-a-plate black-tie dinner, Friday, Sept. 29, at the Sheraton Downtown Civic Center.

MHRC Director Mona Fouad, M.D., says Barkley’s contributions and the funds raised from the gala have been instrumental in developing program to reduce health disparities.

“The funding has seeded new programs,” Fouad says, “including some grassroots community outreach that we expect will have a positive ripple effect on the health of all Birmingham neighborhoods.”

Barkley, a former Leeds High School and Auburn University basketball star, is on board with the center’s mission. “The disparities in health care between blacks and whites in Alabama shouldn’t be so slanted,” he said. “We all are responsible for bridging this gap. I am supporting the UAB Minority Health and Research Center as a statement that education and outreach can help improve communities.”

The Barkley Fund also is extremely important in helping the center develop young people to go into this relatively new field of racial health disparities, Fouad says. “It’s our goal to cultivate a new generation of minority health-care researchers and providers.”

Winners of the 2006 Charles Barkley Health Disparities Research Award to young investigators will be announced at the Sept. 29 Gala. For ticket information, call 877-MHRC-UAB (647-2822).