Tracy Battaglia

Associate Professor, Medicine, School of Medicine; Epidemiology, School of Public Health

Tracy Battaglia, MD MPH is an Associate Professor of Medicine and Epidemiology at Boston University Schools of Medicine and Public Health where she serves as the Director of the Women’s Health Unit, a DHHS designated Center of Excellence in Women’s Health. As a practicing internist and breast health specialist at Boston Medical Center, the largest safety net medical center in New England, her approach to addressing health disparities focuses largely on engaging the community as partners. She has 20 years of experience designing, implementing and evaluating community-engaged research in pursuit of health equity. Her approach is informed by her own experience as a two time cancer survivor. A pioneer in the development of oncology Patient Navigation programs that target under-resourced cancer patients, Dr. Battaglia has contributed to the scientific evidence solidifying the impact of navigation on reducing delays across the continuum of cancer care. As Director of the Community Engagement Program for the Boston University Clinical and Translational Science Award, she is responsible for creating a research environment that supports community engagement in all aspects of translational science. She is currently leading a cooperative study funded by the National Center to Advance Translational Science (NCATS) in partnership with the four Massachusetts Clinical and Translational Science Award (CTSA) hubs (Boston University, Harvard University, Tufts University and University of Massachusetts) to support a City-wide dissemination study to reduce breast cancer disparities through a patient navigation network. Dr. Battaglia has recently expanded her focus to partner with addiction scientist to address the opioid crisis across our state. Her expertise in community engaged research methods and the networks she have developed provide the community infrastructure for the recently funded HEAL award from NIDA (UM1DA049412) for which she lead the Community Engagement Core.