Mountain West Prevention Research Center
Prevention Research Centers Network
The Centers for Disease Control and Prevention funds the Prevention Research Centers Network (PRCs) to conduct research on significant chronic diseases in the U.S. The PRCs work as an interdependent Network of community, academic, and public health partners to study how people and their communities can avoid or reduce their risk for chronic diseases.
All PRCs explore differences between how health interventions work in research settings and how they work in real-world settings, with a focus on improving health outcomes for chronic conditions. They do this by studying how to share interventions proven to promote good health with communities to have the greatest health impact and focus on improving health outcomes. PRCs collaborate with community partners to address local public health priorities and scale up evidence-based interventions.
Mountain West Prevention Research Center
The University of Utah hosts the Mountain West Prevention Research Center (MW- PRC) to address childhood obesity in rural and small communities across Arizona, Colorado, Idaho, Montana, Nevada, New Mexico, Utah, and Wyoming. The MW-PRC is part of a network of 20 academic research centers funded by the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC).
The MW-PRC collaborates with community-based organizations and local experts to develop strategies that engage communities in family healthy weight programs (FHWP) that have proven to promote good health and support lifestyle changes.
Options for FHWP, such as the Building Healthy Families program, provide nutrition education and promote healthful eating and physical activity for families who live in rural communities and small towns and have children aged 6–12.
Announcements
Request for Funding Opportunity
The Mountain West Prevention Research Center (MW-PRC) has teamed up with researchers from the University of Utah and University of Nebraska at Kearney on the Building Healthy Families (BHF) Scale-Up project. The BHF Scale-Up project aims to provide an evidence-based program to communities that identify childhood obesity as a priority.
Communities selected to participate will receive free access the BHF Online Resources Package—including training, implementation materials, and technical support. This study will test whether adding a facilitated learning collaborative strategy to this packaged training improves successful delivery and long-term sustainment of BHF. Approximately half the communities will be assigned to the learning collaborative condition. Communities who are interested in adopting and delivering a family healthy weight program to families they serve are encouraged to apply.
The project offers a funding opportunity covering the BHF Online Resources Package, necessary program supplies, and $6,000 per community for start-up costs ($1,000 from BHF & $5,000 from MW-PRC). Communities that partner with a local clinical partner to use electronic health records to identify eligible families and invite to them via text to enroll in BHF may be eligible for additional MW-PRC funding (Program Implementation Grant), access to our text messaging technology platform, and centralized management of the text-based recruitment strategy being tested in the MW-PRC Core Research Project.
How to apply: Interested communities will need to submit a 1000-word (approximately two-page) Request for Funding narrative that responds to questions related to community priorities and program delivery factors and completion of two organizational readiness surveys. Request for Funding applications are due May 13th at 5:00 CST.
The MW-PRC Partner Grants, the Partnership Development and the Program Implementation, are open for applications on a rolling basis.
Center for Metabolic Health Rising Stars Scholars
Are you or do you know a postdoc with an exciting metabolic health story to share? Nominate yourself or an eligible postdoctoral colleague whose research focuses on health behaviors to present at the fall 2026 Center for Metabolic Health Rising Stars Symposium. All expenses will paid to present and network with other researchers in Salt Lake City on Wednesday April 2nd. Applications are due Friday April 24th.
Join the Mountain West Family Healthy Weight Collaborative
The Mountain West Family Healthy Weight Collaborative (MWFHWC) aims to reduce the prevalence of obesity and related chronic conditions through a supportive network. This collaborative, with representation from community-based organizations who promote whole family health and wellbeing across the Mountain West Region, meets quarterly to network, share knowledge and resources, with the aim to improve health outcomes for families across the region.
Focused on the Mountain West
The Mountain West Prevention Research Center (MW-PRC) is the first PRC with partnerships in Arizona, Colorado, Idaho, Montana, Nevada, New Mexico, Utah, and Wyoming. The MW-PRC helps meet the unique needs of the Mountain West by bringing local community leaders together for region-wide collaborations to leverage assets in rural communities and small towns to address childhood obesity through locally delivered programs.
MW-PRC Leadership
MW-PRC TEAM
The Mountain West Prevention Research Center is supported by the Health Promotion and Disease Prevention Research Center (1U48DP006789), Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, U.S. Department of Health and Human Services (HHS) as part of a financial assistance award. The contents are those of the author(s) and do not necessarily represent the official views of, nor an endorsement, by CDC/HHS, or the U. S. Government.
