A Health Datathon: Data for the Public Good
Join Countway librarians, members of the Public Environmental Data Partners, and fellow data enthusiasts to capture and preserve our public health care data in the Climate and Health Research Coordinating Center Harvard Dataverse Collection. Celebrate Open Access Week by ensuring access to federal environmental data.
Organizers
The Science Behind the Cancer Prevention Studies
Join us on Wednesday, November 12th for a joint seminar of the Department of Epidemiology and the Dana Farber/Harvard Cancer Center, featuring Dr. Alpa Patel discussing The Science Behind the Cancer Prevention Studies.
Abstract: This talk will present a brief history of the Cancer Prevention Studies, a series of large, nationwide prospective cohort studies conducted by the American Cancer Society generationally since the 1950’s. These studies have been instrumental along with other cohorts, such as those conducted at Harvard University, in advancing cancer prevention and control as well as cancer survivorship and outcomes. This talk will present the construct of these cohorts, availability of data and biologic specimens, and key findings from each of the studies.
Bio: Dr. Alpa V. Patel earned her Bachelor of Science from the University of Florida, her Master of Public Health in Epidemiology from the Rollins School of Public Health at Emory University, and her Doctoral degree in Preventive Medicine with a concentration in Epidemiology from the Keck School of Medicine at the University of Southern California. She is the Senior Vice President of Population Science at the American Cancer Society and serves as the principal investigator of the Cancer Prevention Studies (CPS) II and 3, two long-term, large-scale, epidemiologic cohort studies established by the American Cancer Society. Combined, these two cohorts include over 1.5 million participants with a variety of over 400,000 biologic samples (such as blood, buccal cells, saliva, stool, and tumor tissue). Additionally, as the co-Principal Investigator, Dr. Patel and team launched the largest ever cancer cohort of Black women in the U.S. aimed to enroll at least 100,000 Black women to understand the multi-level drivers of cancer risk and outcomes in this population. Dr. Patel is a recognized leader in cancer epidemiology with particular emphases on the role of physical inactivity, obesity, sedentary behavior and cancer as well as risk assessment and blood-based markers of cancer detection. She has published nearly 300 scientific articles and book chapters, and her research has contributed significantly to national and international cancer prevention guidelines, such as the US Physical Activity Guidelines for Health and the American Cancer Society’s Nutrition and Physical Activity Guidelines for both cancer prevention and cancer survivorship.
Speaker Information
Alpa Patel, PhD
Organizers
Related Events
Ben Johnson: Introducing Nature Health
Join us for this exciting opportunity to hear about the new journal Nature Health from its chief editor, Ben Johnson. Ben will discuss the aims, scope, and themes of the journal and will answer questions from the audience.
Ben Johnson trained in infectious diseases, with an undergraduate degree in virology from the University of Warwick, UK, a PhD in influenza virus from Public Health England and the University of Reading, UK, and a postdoc on smallpox vaccines at Imperial College London. Ben has more than 15 years of experience in publishing, journalism, communications and engagement, including as an Associate Publisher at BMC, Head of Communities & Engagement at Springer Nature and Senior Magazine Editor at Nature Medicine, with responsibility for news and opinion content. He has a strong interest in research conducted in resource-limited settings, including in the global south, in how research influences health policy and in equitable strategies to involve patients and communities in research. He is based in the London office.
Visit the Nature Health website to learn more about the new journal.
Speaker Information
Ben Johnson
Organizers
Social Demography Seminar with Atheendar Venkataramani
Atheendar Venkataramani, PhD, associate professor, medical ethics and health policy, Perelman School of Medicine, University of Pennsylvania, presents “Political power and mortality: Heterogeneous effects of the U.S. Voting Rights Act.” This seminar is co-sponsored by the Department of Social and Behavioral Sciences at Harvard T.H. Chan School of Public Health.
The Social Demography Seminar (SDS) series at the Center for Population and Development Studies provides a lively forum for scholars from across the university to discuss in-progress social scientific and population research. Social demography includes work that uses demographic methods to describe and explain the distribution of social goods across populations. The hybrid series offers presentations on a wide variety of topics such as family, gender, race/ethnicity, population health—including mortality, morbidity, and functional health—inequality, immigration, fertility, and the institutional arrangements that shape and respond to population processes.
This event is open to the public. Please RSVP if you plan on attending.
Speaker Information
Atheendar Venkataraman, PhD
Organizers
Harvard Pop Center Social Demography Seminar: “Why have mortality rates become increasingly unequal across U.S. counties?”
Jennifer Karas Montez, PhD, University Professor of Sociology, Syracuse University, presents “Why have mortality rates become increasingly unequal across U.S. counties?”
The Social Demography Seminar (SDS) series at the Center for Population and Development Studies provides a lively forum for scholars from across the university to discuss in-progress social scientific and population research. Social demography includes work that uses demographic methods to describe and explain the distribution of social goods across populations. The hybrid series offers presentations on a wide variety of topics such as family, gender, race/ethnicity, population health—including mortality, morbidity, and functional health—inequality, immigration, fertility, and the institutional arrangements that shape and respond to population processes.
Speaker Information
Jennifer Karas Montez, PhD
Organizers
Harvard Pop Center Social Demography Seminar: “Impacts of post-Dobbs state abortion restrictions on work-related well-being of obstetrician-gynecologists”
Erika Sabbath, ScD, associate professor, School of Social Work, Boston College, presents “Impacts of post-Dobbs state abortion restrictions on the work-related well-being of obstetrician-gynecologists.”
The Social Demography Seminar (SDS) series at the Center for Population and Development Studies provides a lively forum for scholars from across the university to discuss in-progress social scientific and population research. Social demography includes work that uses demographic methods to describe and explain the distribution of social goods across populations. The hybrid series offers presentations on a wide variety of topics such as family, gender, race/ethnicity, population health—including mortality, morbidity, and functional health—inequality, immigration, fertility, and the institutional arrangements that shape and respond to population processes.
Please register in advance to attend this event. This event is open to the public.
Speaker Information
Erika Sabbath, ScD
Organizers
Brown Bag Seminar: The Front Line Indigenous Partnership Program: Addressing Indigenous health care disparities and support for AIAN pathway programs
Valerie Dobiesz, MD, MPH, is an associate professor at Harvard Medical School and emergency physician practicing clinically at Brigham Women’s Hospital, Tsehootsooi Medical Center, and Sage Memorial Hospital on the Navajo Nation. Her current academic responsibilities include directing the Front Line Indigenous Partnership (FLIP) Program based in the Mass General Brigham Department of Emergency Medicine Office of IDEaS (Inclusion, Diversity, Equity, and Social Justice) and serving as core faculty at Harvard Humanitarian Initiative leading the Program on Indigenous Health Disparities.
Dr. Dobiesz is the director of the FLIP Program with a mission to improve American Indian and Alaska Native (AIAN) health and eliminate existing health disparities through educational, clinical, and administrative partnerships and the development of healthcare career pathway programs. In this capacity, she works clinically and oversees BWH emergency physicians that work at Tribally managed hospitals in the Navajo Nation to increase the clinical capacity and quality of care provided in this rural and historically underserved health care context.
Her research and scholarship have focused on eliminating health disparities for AIAIN populations, developing the AIAN healthcare workforce, simulation medical education, maintaining medical education during war, and improving maternal health in emergency and low resource settings. She currently leads and collaborates on multiple projects focused on mitigating AIAN health disparities such as creating an academic medical center partnership with a Tribally managed hospital as an innovative mutually beneficial healthcare delivery model and studying the impact of healthcare career pathway programs for Native students.
Speaker Information
Valerie Dobiesz
Organizers
Special Book Launch Event for “Inherited Inequality” by Christina Cross
Christina Cross, a former postdoctoral fellow and current faculty member, has authored the newly published book “Inherited Inequality: Why Opportunity Gaps Persist between Black and White Youth Raised in Two-Parent Families.”
Please join us at Harvard Pop Center for a conversation between Lawrence Bobo, W. E. B. Du Bois Professor of the Social Sciences, Harvard University, and author Christina Cross, followed by a reception. (The discussion will also be accessible via Zoom). Limited quantities of the book will be available for purchase (cash only) at a reduced price of $15.00.
Speaker Information
Lawrence Bobo
Christina Cross
Organizers
Know our rights: Legal updates for immigrant health
Event description
Join the Leah Zallman Center for Immigrant Health Research (LZC), François-Xavier Bagnoud (FXB) Center for Health and Human Rights at Harvard University, the Health & Law Immigrant Solidarity Network (HLISN), and Massachusetts healthcare partners for a virtual update on immigration law and policy from panelists Susan Church, Chief Operating Officer & Legal Advisor at MA Office for Refugees and Immigrants (ORI); and Heather Yountz, Senior Immigration Staff Attorney at Massachusetts Law Reform Institute.
Healthcare leaders, providers, workers, public health professionals, and members of the public encouraged to attend. Speaker remarks are based on their own scholarship and experience. As such, they speak for themselves, not for Harvard University.
Speaker Information
Susan Church
Heather Yountz
Organizers
Innovations in immigrant mental health
Join us for a conversation with colleagues from the Cambridge Economic Opportunity Committee and the Somerville Public Library to learn about innovative ways in which community-based programs and services are addressing the mental health and wellbeing of immigrants. The Partnerships for Community Mental Health and Immigrant Well-being initiative is cohosted by the FXB Center for Health and Human Rights and the Harvard T.H. Chan School of Public Health Office of Field Education and Practice. This project aims to examine the mental healthcare landscape in Massachusetts and learn from immigrant-led, culturally rooted, community-based approaches to mental health.
Additional details:
Main talk from 1:00pm-1:50pm EDT at the Harvard T.H. Chan School of Public Health, Kresge 200 (677 Huntington Ave, Boston, MA, 02115). The conversation will continue at the Jonathan M. Mann Conference Room (FXB Building, 7th Floor, 651 Huntington Ave, Boston, MA).
Moderator: Margaret (Maggie) Sullivan, FNP-BC, DrPH, FAAN
Margaret (Maggie) Sullivan is an Instructor and Director of the FXB Center for Health and Human Rights Program on Immigrants and Unhoused Communities, a Distinguished Fellow of the National Academies of Practice (NAP) in Nursing, and a Fellow of the American Academy of Nursing (FAAN). She is a nationally board-certified family nurse practitioner dedicated to serving immigrant communities, especially those with precarious documentation status or at risk of homelessness. Maggie co-leads the Partnership for Community Mental Health and Immigrant Well-being with her colleague, Jocelyn Chu, a project which aims to examine the mental healthcare landscape in Massachusetts and learn from immigrant-led, culturally rooted, community-based approaches to mental health. She co-advises the Harvard Students Human Rights Collaborative (HSHRC) and conducts forensic medical evaluations for asylum with Harvard Medical School’s Asylum Clinic. In collaboration with the Initiative on Health & Homelessness, Maggie co-developed and co-teaches HPM 523: Homelessness and Health: Lessons from Health Care, Public Health, and Research. Since 2009, Maggie has practiced at Boston Health Care for the Homeless (BHCHP), providing primary care to immigrant and limited English proficient (LEP) patients in shelter-based clinics. In March of 2019 she launched Oasis, an immigrant health clinic at BHCHP where immigrants experiencing homelessness are connected with interdisciplinary and multilingual health services. Maggie also works as a clinical consultant with the Massachusetts League of Community Health Center’s farmworker health program. Between 2010-2017, she collaborated with Partners In Health in Chiapas, Mexico and Guatemala.
Speakers:
Rachel Plummer is the Associate Director at Cambridge Economic Opportunity Committee (CEOC), Cambridge’s anti-poverty nonprofit. Rachel has been working at CEOC for 4 years. She began as a graduate student intern at CEOC during her Master of Public Health program at the Harvard T. H. Chan School of Public Health. Before working at CEOC, she worked at Massachusetts General Hospital in clinical research related to addiction medicine. Rachel’s current position at CEOC touches all of CEOC’s program areas with a particular focus on food insecurity and mental health. She leads the agency’s community-based mental health program, where non-clinicians deliver a 5-session mental health intervention. Rachel is deeply committed to hearing and centering the voices of community members and incorporating those voices in programmatic and policy decision making.
Jake Savage, is the Library Social Worker at Somerville Public Library. A Somerville resident with a background in immigrant and refugee health, he is passionate about increasing equity in the community through advocacy, programming, and access to resources and information. He also loves to read, hike, and solve crossword puzzles!
This event is co-sponsored by the Harvard T.H. Chan School of Public Health Field Education and Practice Office.
Speaker remarks are based on their own scholarship and experience. As such, they speak for themselves, not for Harvard University.