UTSA researcher empowers community health workers with ChatGPT

UTSA’s AJ Delgado and Rebeca Martinez are analyzing data to address health disparities.

FEBRUARY 17, 2025 — AJ Delgado, a postdoctoral fellow in the UTSA Department of Public Health, has spent his career analyzing data to understand health disparities. Now he’s equipping community-based health organizations with the same tools and methods to tackle them head-on.

Through specialized training, he’s helping staff who oversee their organization’s health data make sense of their numbers using generative AI. By translating complex data into actionable insights, these organizations can strengthen their grant proposals, create data-driven reports and make suggestions on interventions using data driven approaches. Ultimately, they are learning to convert data into real-world applications to bridge the health gaps that impact Texas communities. For Delgado, it’s not just about research; it’s about change.

Funded by the Institute for Integration of Medicine and Science, the six-week training guided community health professionals on ways to analyze data using RStudio, a statistical software, and ChatGPT, a generative AI tool. The program merged online and live sessions to enhance skills in assessing HIV datasets and creating code to create dynamic reports.

Delgado worked with two community partners in San Antonio: the Ryan White HIV/AIDS Program and the Latino Commission on AIDS. Organizations like these typically work with a lot of data but often require data analysts to serve in various roles beyond their responsibilities in data management and data analytics.

“I wanted this project to answer two questions,” Delgado said. “How are they currently analyzing their data, and are there available tools to help them be more efficient?”

Delgado created the workshop to make their jobs easier by teaching them how to use generative AI to build code for RStudio (also known simply as R) to analyze these large datasets more easily and more efficiently.

“When organizations can efficiently analyze data, it can not only improve the time it takes to create a report but also help reduce the amount of time and mental bandwidth a data analyst uses to analyze numerous rows and columns of data,” Delgado said.

Delgado also recruited current UTSA students to work on the project. Rebeca Martinez, who is pursuing a master’s degree in psychology, jumped at the opportunity to join the workshop as part of her role as graduate research assistant.

“This was an amazing opportunity to collaborate with professionals from various community-focused fields and support them in developing skills with R, including coding, filtering and mapping datasets,” Martinez said. “Working with R, which is a free and extremely versatile statistical software, has not only strengthened my technical expertise in data analysis but also emphasized the importance of using accessible tools to conduct meaningful research.”

Delgado’s initiative — which he hopes to continue in years to come — not only boosts evidence-based decision-making in underserved communities, but also sets the stage for future experiential learning programs in data analysis within the nonprofit sector.

“Understanding data is only as complicated as the person explaining it,” Delgado said. “We use numbers all the time. When we purchase items from Amazon, we probably spend more time looking at ratings than the actual product we’re purchasing. We're using data to make the best decisions. I believe that most health data can be translated in a way that the everyday consumer can use to make better choices about their health.”

Delgado has been part of the UTSA community since 2009, earning his bachelor’s in psychology, a master’s degree in health and kinesiology, and a Ph.D. in applied demography, all from the UTSA College for Health, Community and Policy. He also has a master’s degree in quantitative methods from UT-Austin.

His current appointment is in the UTSA Department of Public Health.

“My interest in public health was a natural result of all my degrees,” Delgado explained. “It is the perfect discipline that allows me to apply all of my professional background and academic interests.”

Delgado hopes this project will be a catalyst for lasting change. By equipping community health-based organizations with the skills to efficiently analyze data, Delgado said he hopes that he can help build a more data-proficient workforce in San Antonio, especially in nonprofits that serve as hubs for access to health care for underserved communities.

Ultimately, this work isn’t just about numbers — it’s about people. With better data-driven strategies, these organizations can make a tangible impact, fostering a healthier San Antonio.

— Amanda Cerreto