Students
News
BCHS Doctoral Student, Courtney Colonna-Pydyn, Has Two Articles Published
Greeno, C.G., Colonna-Pydyn, C. and Shumway, M. "The need to adapt standardized outcomes measures for community mental health. Journal of Health and Social Policy. In press.
Colonna-Pydyn, C., Gjesfjeld, C.D., and Grenno, C.G., "The Factor Structure of the Barriers to Treatment Participation Scale (BTPS): Implications for Future Barriers Scale Development. Administration and Policy in Mental Health (2007) 34:563-569. Click here to view article.
MPH Candidate Accepts Position for State of Maine
Adriene Whitaker, RN MPH candidate has accepted a position as a Public Health Nurse II for the State of Maine. This position will primarily focus on TB control measures for the homeless and incarcerated in Portland and the greater Portland area with an emphasis on networking, building coalitions and providing training to area shelters and
correctional facilities. She will be responsible for creating an infrastructure for reporting TB cases within shelters as well as among recently released convicts to enable access to care and follow-up for latent Tuberculosis infections. She will also be case managing the LTBI cases among the homeless and be responding to active TB outbreaks.
Pitt's Center for Latin American Studies Has Awarded the Inaugural Eduardo Lozano Memorial Dissertation Prize
Christine Hippert, who recently completed the joint PhD and Master of Public Health program in anthropology and public health from the University of Pittsburgh, has been awarded the inaugural Eduardo Lozano Memorial Dissertation Prize. The prize, which includes a cash award of $1,250, honors internationally renowned librarian Eduardo Lozano's passion for knowledge and academic rigor.
Hippert was nominated for her dissertation, titled “Identity and Development in Rural Bolivia: Negotiating Gender, Ethnicity, and Class in Development Contexts.” The Eduardo Lozano Memorial Dissertation Prize was created to honor the life and work of the late Eduardo Lozano, who founded and directed the Latin American collection at Hillman Library from 1967 until his death in August 2006. Lozano developed the collection into one of the most outstanding of its kind in the world.
Prior to coming to Pitt, Hippert completed a master's degree in medical anthropology at the University of Wyoming and a bachelor's degree, cum laude, in psychology with concentrations in education and Spanish at Clark University. She will assume a tenure-track position as an assistant professor in the Department of Sociology and Archaeology at the University of Wisconsin-La Crosse in the fall.
The prize will be awarded annually for the best doctoral dissertation at Pitt on a topic related to Latin America, the Caribbean, or Latin American communities in other countries. It is funded by annual contributions from the Center for Latin American Studies, the Department of Hispanic Languages and Literatures in the School of Arts and Sciences, and donations to the Eduardo Lozano Memorial Dissertation Prize Fund.
This year's nominated dissertations were evaluated by a selection committee consisting of Professor G. Reid Andrews, University Center for International Studies, history; Professor John Beverley, Spanish and Latin American literature and cultural studies; and Carmelo Mesa-Lago, Distinguished Service Professor Emeritus of Economics and Latin American Studies.
A bound copy of the winning dissertation will be on display in the Latin American Reading Room of Hillman Library. The room, dedicated in 2002, represents the fulfillment of Lozano's aspiration for a place where Latin Americans and Latin Americanists could meet and exchange ideas. The reading room houses a variety of newspapers, journals, reference materials, and two of Lozano's paintings.
Lozano was born in Buenos Aires, Argentina, in 1925. In addition to being a distinguished librarian, Lozano was a renowned painter and poet.
Next year's competition will welcome nominations of dissertations successfully defended between May 1, 2007, and Aug. 9, 2008. The deadline and nomination procedures will be forthcoming this fall. For more information, contact John Frechione at 412-648-7395 or jfrech@pitt.edu.
BCHS STUDENTS PARTICIPATE AS BRIDGING THE GAPS SUMMER INTERNS
Lisa Greco (School of Social Work) and Yvette Wing
Mara DeLuca
BCHS Students, Yvette Wing and Mara DeLuca were selected as Bridging the Gaps Interns (BTG) for the summer of 2006. The Bridging the Gaps Community Health Summer Internship Program is a collaborative effort in Pittsburgh, Philadelphia and Erie between interdisciplinary academic medical center programs and more than a 100 community-based organizations. The goals of BTG are to provide an interdisciplinary cooperative experience to students and also to assist organizations in addressing the health and welfare needs of under-served communities. Ms. Wing and Lisa Greco, a social work student, worked with the Pittsburgh AIDS Task Force to develop an empowerment initiative for women, titled “My SISTA, My Self”. Their project was highlighted at the 10th Annual BTG Symposium. Ms. DeLuca teamed with Glaivy Batsuli, a medical student on a health education project with the Hazelwood YMCA. Both Ms. DeLuca’s and Ms.Wing’s poster presentations will be displayed in the BCHS second floor hallway during the month of September. Congratulations to Mara and Yvette. Congratulations also to Dr. James Butler, BCHS faculty member who delivered the keynote presentation at this year’s BTG Symposium.
RECENT GRADUATE HIRED
Congratulations to Eun-Young Ahn, a recent BCHS graduate, who has been hired by the Haitian Health Foundation as a Monitoring Evaluation Administrator. She will be working in the town of Jeremy and has signed on for a one-year stint, with additional years possible.
MEGAN KAVANAUGH RECEIVES SCHOLARSHIP
Megan Kavanaugh, a doctoral student in BCHS, received the Gary Stewart Scholarship for Research in Public Health from the Association of Reproductive Professionals (ARHP), an award designated for a public health graduate student who proposes a significant research project that addresses a pressing current issue in the field of public health, especially as it may pertain to reproductive health, and related public welfare issues. This scholarship provides support to complete the research and to travel to La Jolla, CA to present it during the ARHP annual conference September 6-10. Ms. Kavanaugh will be presenting a poster: "Emergency Misconceptions: A National Survey of Emergency Contraceptive Services in Children's Hospital Emergency Departments."
Abstract: Timely use of emergency contraception (EC) after all contraceptive failures could prevent up to 50% of all unintended pregnancies. EC may be especially useful to adolescents because of their erratic patterns of sexual behavior and contraceptive use. Providing EC during emergency department hospital visits is vitally important in helping adolescents to prevent unwanted pregnancies. This poster presentation will focus on ongoing research that assesses the type and amount of EC services provided to adolescents in these hospital settings nationwide. Preliminary results indicate that children's hospital emergency department physicians are not meeting the current standard of care for emergency contraceptive counseling and prescribing practices with adolescents. This research has potential implications for legislative and hospital policy change to improve the availability of emergency contraceptive services to adolescents, and hence to an eventual reduction in the unintended pregnancy rate among adolescents.
Position Announcements
Faculty Position, University of Pittsburgh's School of Dental Medicine
The University of Pittsburgh School of Dental Medicine is seeking applications for the position of Assistant or Associate Professor of Dental Public Health. The position is in the tenure-track/tenure stream and could start as early as Fall, 2006. This individual will be responsible for developing an independent research program related to community interventions, oral health disparities, dental public health, epidemiology, or a related area. This person will be joining a department that contains a large collaborative group of NIH-funded investigators engaged in population-based research related to health disparities, social epidemiology, health psychology, and genetics. For more information, see www.dental.pitt.edu/research/research_oralhealth.php . The extent to which the applicant’s research activities coordinate with and complement the ongoing research enterprise will be considered in the selection process.
By the time of appointment, applicants must have a PhD or DrPH degree in epidemiology, community psychology, health psychology, intervention trials, health services research, or other related areas. To be considered for an appointment at the Associate level, a track record of NIH-level funding is expected. The position will require limited teaching and student mentorship.
Salary and academic rank for this position are commensurate with experience and qualifications. Please send curriculum vitae, statements of research and teaching interests, representative publications, and the names and addresses of three references to: Dr. Robert J. Weyant, Professor and Chair, Department of Dental Public Health, University of Pittsburgh School of Dental Medicine, 3501 Terrace Street, Pittsburgh, PA 15261, Telephone: (412) 648-3076, E-Mail: rjw1@pitt.edu