In May 2017, ELIZABETH VAN NOSTRAND and her team from the Center for Public Health Practice were honored with the Medical Reserve Corps Program National Partner Recognition Award for the development of ELI, the Emergency Law Inventory tool — a repository of statutes and regulations that impact volunteers participating in emergency response activities on the topics of liability, license reciprocity, scope of practice, and workers’ benefits.
EDMOND SUN - The American Society of Human Genetics has given its 2017 Mentorship Award to JOHN J. MULVIHILL, first chair of Pitt Public Health's Department of Human Genetics and co-director of the Pittsburgh Genetics Institute until 1998.
On Wednesday, July 19, 2017, Dean DONALD S. BURKE addressed members of the Allegheny County Overdose Prevention Coalition at their 2017 Summer Conference. The conference theme was New Perspectives on the Opioid Crisis, and Burke’s keynote address was titled Forcasting and Deflecting the Opioid Epidemic Curve.
BLOOMBERG - If a pharmaceutical company wants to gain access to the VA’s market, it has an incentive to offer the VA a lower price on its drugs, said HPM’s WALID GELLAD. But would drug companies simply raise their prices to the VA?
PITTSBURGH BUSINESS TIMES - Alumna LAURA GRIFFIN (HPM ’13) has been honored by Pittsburgh Business Times as a 2017 30 Under 30 award winner. Her contributions as director of network nursing operations at Allegheny Health Network has brought her to the attention of management.
ENDOCRINE TODAY - “Midlife and the menopause transition is a time when women typically gain weight, and losing it is difficult because there are multiple things going on,” REBECCA THURSTON (EPI) told Endocrine Today . “Women’s physiology is changing, their lives are very busy, and they’re caring, oftentimes, for partners, children and aging parents, so it is a challenge.”
STAT NEWS - One health plan option Trump’s administration is considering may not be much of a deal for consumers. “It’s not going to lower prices substantially, certainly not in the short term and probably not in the long term,” said WALID GELLAD, HPM assistant professor and co-director of the Center for Pharmaceutical Policy and Prescribing at Pitt. “It’s an easy way out of addressing the real complexities.”
NEW YORK TIMES - This doctoral alum is amazing! CHRIS TAYLOR (EPI '10), who was inducted into the Pitt Public Health Delta Omega Honor Society chapter in May 2017, won best in show in the amateur division at the American Pie Council's championship in June in Orlando, Florida. His winner beat 205 other entries with a recipe inspired in part by a Take5 candy bar, one of his favorites.
WV PUBLIC RADIO - Professor and dean emeritus BERNARD GOLDSTEIN said he thinks the gas industry, which is highly fragmented, has missed opportunities to clearly address concerns about its own environmental effects. Those include air and water pollution near drilling sites, disposal concerns related to drilling waste, and the greenhouse gas emissions that result from methane leakage. As a result, any health effects remain to be clearly understood....
GOOGLE SCHOLAR - In June 2017, Google Scholar released a collection of highly-cited papers in their area of research that have stood the test of time. These Classic Papers were published in 2006 and the list includes the ten most-cited articles, proving that though research is often about the latest findings, some have an impact long after their publication.
We are proud to report that in the field of epidemiology, the Classic Papers list includ...
NEWSDAY - Asked about the keys to preventing depression, BCHS professor CHARLES REYNOLDS says, “It’s relatively straightforward for older adults who have relatively mild symptoms. We teach people better coping skills, better problem-solving skills and better sleep habits, and we encourage healthier lifestyles with more physical activities and better diets. Better self-care helps reduce the risk of depression in older adults, maybe by 20 to 25 per...
UPMC INSIDE - As it wrestles with an ongoing measles outbreak (35 deaths in the past year), Europe may soon learn more about the impact of vaccination programs, thanks to Pitt Public Health’s PROJECT TYCHO analysis just getting underway. Watch a video explaining how the data tool works.
Beginning September 5, access between Parran and Crabtree halls will be available via the SECOND floor hallway.
PBS NEWSHOUR - Reporter Roni Dengler asked ANNE NEWMAN, epidemiology chair and former geriatrician, for comments on this new study. Newman voiced concern that the all-male cohort’s inconsistent participation may have skewed the results toward healthier individuals. The senior author from Upsala University acknowledged this limitation, noting that it’s possible the trends they see would be stronger if there had been less bias.
PITTSBURGH POST GAZETTE - Pennsylvania Attorney General Josh Shapiro hopes that destroying unused pills will help curb the state’s opioid epidemic. The University of Pittsburgh Graduate School of Public Health will be assessing the distribution of 300,000 drug-deactivation pouches in partnership with the state office and the Pennsylvania Medical Society.
Alumna KATIE BARIC (BCHS ’17), co-founder of the NGO, Hands on Peru, reports that “in June alone, we hosted 11 international volunteers, 9 health campaigns, and served 140 patients!&drquo;
Last month BCHS faculty TIFFANY GARY-WEBB and ELIZABETH FELTER met in Chicago with staff at Feeding America about evaluating community-based diabetes prevention programs in food banks.
KRISTINA WINT (BCHS ’17) will begin a new position in the School of Medicine’s Department of Family Medicine with Dr. Lisa Schlar. She will coordinate interconception care for mothers using well baby visits to promote mother’s health.
Noble A-W Maseru, PhD, MPH, will join Pitt Public Health as director of the Center for Health Equity (CHE), associate dean for diversity, and professor of public health practice in the Department of Behavioral and Community Health Sciences. Maseru served for more than a decade as health commissioner for the City of Cincinnati Health Department where he oversaw more than 400 employees and an annual budget of $49 million dollars.
SCIENCE ALERT - From the invention of the steam-powered boat engine to the sequencing of the human genome, each state can claim its own scientific advancements. Pennsylvania claims Jonas Salk’s polio vaccine, invented while working at the University of Pittsburgh. The vaccine is now used worldwide, and the World Health Organization thinks the disease can be eradicated in the near future. The number of cases is down from 22,000 cases in 1952 in th...