Weekly Global Health Research Seminar Series- Fall 2020.
Join the Global Health Department as we host weekly research seminars open to the SPH community. The speakers are a combination of our own GH Department faculty and staff as well as colleagues and friends of the GH Department. Come hear the work of these researchers who’s impact stretches across the world!
Any questions contact: sphgh@bu.edu
Mondays from 1:00-2:00pm
Due to the COVID-19 pandemic, the Global Health Research Seminar Series will be occurring via Zoom.
Monday, September 14
Zoom meeting
Tuberculosis in South Africa: novel diagnostics, outcomes, and transmission
The pace of development in tuberculosis diagnostics and treatment has accelerated in the past decade and no-where has the impact been more evident than in South Africa: an early adopter of new diagnostic technologies and treatment options for drug-resistant tuberculosis. This presentation will focus on results of diagnostic trials of Xpert Ultra, implications of Xpert Ultra for active TB case finding, and the cost and outcomes of drug-resistant TB treatment in a longitudinal cohort.
Ribka (Rebecca) Berhanu, M.D.
Instructor, Department of Global Heath, BUSPH
Health Economics and Epidemiology Research Office
University of Witwatersrand, South Africa
Read more about the speaker
Ribka Berhanu, MD is an infectious disease physician and clinical researcher, with a focus on tuberculosis (TB). She is currently an instructor in the Department of Global Health at Boston University SPH and holds a joint appointment with the University of the Witwatersrand’s Health Economics and Epidemiology Research Office (HE2RO) in Johannesburg, South Africa. She has lived and worked in Johannesburg since 2011, where she provides clinical care for patients with HIV, TB and other infectious diseases at the Helen Joseph Hospital. She also conducts TB research in collaboration with HE2RO, the Perinatal HIV Research Unit, the National Health Laboratory Service and the National Institute of Communicable Diseases. She was recently awarded an NIH K08 award to study the social networks and molecular epidemiology of drug-resistant TB in Johannesburg, South Africa.
Monday, September 21
Zoom meeting
Assessing the Impact of the Covid-19 Pandemic on US Mortality: A County-Level Analysis.
Andrew Stokes, PhD
Assistant Professor in the Department of Global Health
Boston University School of Public Health
Read more about the speaker
Andrew C. Stokes, PhD is an Assistant Professor in the Department of Global Health at the Boston University School of Public Health. His research examines population health and health disparities across the life course. His specific interests include research on the determinants of national and regional mortality trends in the US and investigations into the causes and consequences of global increases in the burden of disease from chronic non-communicable conditions. Dr. Stokes received his PhD in Demography and Sociology from the University of Pennsylvania in 2014.
Dielle Lundberg
research fellow in the Department of Global Health
Boston University School of Public Health
Read more about the speaker
Dielle Lundberg (she/her or they/them) is a research fellow in the Department of Global Health at the Boston University School of Public Health.
Monday, September 28
Zoom meeting
Global Health equity begins at home: income inequities and population health outcomes
Dr. Salma Abdalla, MD, MPH
Read more about the speaker
Salma M Abdalla is a physician by training. She is a research fellow and the lead Project Director of the Rockefeller-Boston University 3-D Commission on Determinants of health, Data science, and Decision making. Dr Abdalla’s research focuses on applying a system’s thinking approach to the social, political, and commercial determinants of health. She is also interested in studying the effects of mass traumas in shaping the mental health of populations.
Monday, October 5
Zoom meeting
Meeting ID: 919 9035 6254
Passcode: 496014
Tracking resource contributions towards development assistance for health
Dr. Angela Micah
Assistant Professor at the Department of Health Metrics Sciences and Institute for Health Metrics and Evaluation (IHME) at the University of Washington
Read more about the speaker
Angela Esi Micah is an Assistant Professor at the Department of Health Metrics Sciences and Institute for Health Metrics and Evaluation (IHME) at the University of Washington. Her research focuses on tracking development assistance for health and evaluating health financing policies in low and middle-income countries. At IHME, she co-leads the Development Assistance for Health Resource tracking team, which produces global estimates of resource flows from high-income countries and development agencies to low and middle-income countries aimed at the maintenance and improvement of health. The team recently published the report Financing Global Health 2019: Tracking health spending in a time of crisis. She holds a PhD in Global Health Management and Policy with specialization in Health Economics from Tulane University’s School of Public Health, a M.A. in International and Development Economics from Yale University and a B.A. in Economics from Oberlin College. She is an alumnus of the World Bank Africa Fellowship Program.
Monday, October 26
Zoom meeting
Meeting ID: 957 4630 252
Passcode: 225476
Burden of Chronic Obstructive Pulmonary Disease Attributable to Tuberculosis: A Microsimulation Study
Reese Sy, MS
doctoral candidate in Epidemiology at Boston University School of Public Health
Read more about the speaker
Reese Sy, MS is a third-year doctoral candidate in Epidemiology at Boston University School of Public Health. Her research experience combines epidemiologic methods with novel approaches to analyzing infectious disease data, with a focus on epidemic modeling, geospatial modeling, and machine learning in tuberculosis and COVID-19. She earned her B.A. in Molecular Biology and Biochemistry at Wesleyan University, and her M.S. in Epidemiology at Columbia University.
Monday, November 2
Zoom meeting
Meeting ID: 957 4630 2524
Passcode: 225476
Innovations in global mental health research and implementation
Laura Murray, M.A., PhD.
doctoral candidate in Epidemiology at Boston University School of Public Health
Read more about the speaker
Dr. Laura Murray is a Senior Scientist at Johns Hopkins University, School of Public Health in the Department of Mental Health and International Health; a clinical psychologist by training. Dr. Murray has extensive expertise in a wide range of evidence-based treatments for mental and behavioral health problems. She has conducted research ranging from qualitatively understanding mental health, to full randomized trials of treatments focusing on low and middle income countries globally such as Zambia, Democratic Republic of Congo, Ethiopia, Myanmar, Ukraine, Iraq, Cambodia, Papua New Guinea and many others. She is a developer of the Common Elements Treatment Approach (CETA), which was recently shown to significantly reduce interpersonal violence and alcohol abuse in Zambia. She is passionate about thinking about more scalable sustainable models and systems of mental health care in LMIC. Dr. Murray publishes extensively on global mental health in top journals, trains globally, and regularly speaks at conferences and organizations.
Monday, November 9
Zoom meeting
Meeting ID: 957 4630 2524
Passcode: 225476
Prevention of mother to child HIV transmission, the consequences of success: The Zambia HIV-exposed uninfected infant cohort study
Dr. Julie Herlihy
Read more about the speaker
Julie Herlihy, MD, MPH, is a pediatrician with over 20 years of experience working in sub-Saharan Africa on community-based research and service delivery to improve health outcomes for children and families in low resource settings. Currently, Dr. Herlihy is a Clinical Associate Professor in Pediatrics with the Boston University School of Medicine. Dr. Herlihy practices clinical pediatrics at Boston Medical Center and has a research focus on how to effectively deliver maternal, child health in LMICs with a particular interest in HIV-exposed but uninfected infants and their neurodevelopment.
Dr. Donald Thea
Read more about the speaker
Donald Thea, MD , MSc, is an infectious disease trained physician and Professor of Global Health in the Department of Global Health in the Boston University School of Public Health. Dr. Thea’s main areas of research interest over the prior 30 years have been childhood pneumonia in developing countries and mother to child transmission of HIV in LMICs. Dr.Thea’s current research interest is in the altered immunology or other risk factors that confer increased infectious disease morbidity and mortality to HIV exposed but uninfected (HEU) children.
Monday, November 16
Zoom meeting
Meeting ID: 957 4630 2524
Passcode: 225476
Alleviating Time Poverty Among the Working Poor: Results from a Pre-Registered Longitudinal Field Experiment
Ashley Whillans, PhD
Read more about the speaker
]Ashley Whillans is the author of TIME SMART: How to Reclaim Your Time and Live a Happier Life (October 6, 2020). She is an assistant professor at Harvard Business School and a leading scholar in the time and happiness research field. She earned her PhD in social psychology from the University of British Columbia. Whillans was twice named a Rising Star of Behavioral Science by the Behavioral Science & Policy Association. In 2016 she cofounded a “nudge unit,” namely, the Department of Behavioral Science in the Policy, Innovation, and Engagement division of the British Columbia Public Service Agency. She is part of the Global Happiness Council and the Workplace and Well-Being Initiative at Harvard University, and she advises on workplace and well-being strategies for numerous nonprofit and for-profit partners. Most recently, she is part of the Lancet’s COVID-19 mental health commission. She has written about her research, which has appeared in numerous outlets, including the New York Times, the Washington Post, the LA Times, CNN, BBC, The Atlantic, The Economist, and the Wall Street Journal.
Monday, November 23
Zoom meeting
Meeting ID: 957 4630 2524
Passcode: 225476
Diagnosis and Management of Heart Failure in Rural Low-Income Countries
Dr. Gene Kwan
Read more about the speaker
Dr. Gene Kwan is a cardiologist and global health researcher studying global cardiovascular disease epidemiology and health service delivery/implementation research. Dr. Kwan is active in the development, implementation, evaluation, improvement and dissemination of integrated chronic care programs targeted to overcome specific barriers in rural low- and middle-income countries (LMIC). His research stems from experience in the field in rural Rwanda and Haiti since 2008 in collaboration with local Ministries of Health and the non-governmental organizations Partners In Health and Zanmi Lasante.