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TB Notes NewsletterReturn to TB Notes 3, 2006 Main Menu This is an archived document. The links and content are no longer being updated. No. 3, 2006PERSONNEL NOTESPhilip Baptiste, M.Ed., left DTBE on June 23, 2006. Philip worked in the Information Technology and Statistics Branch as Project Lead for the NEDSS TB Surveillance PAM. As the Project Lead, Philip provided the leadership in carrying out tasks to ensure that the project met all the established timelines, costs, and performance goals. He was responsible for coordinating and disseminating information to the appropriate public and private groups concerning the project’s progress at each lifecycle milestone. In addition, Phil effectively used the CDC Enterprise System Catalog, an Internet Web application, to inventory all DTBE IT investments and thus allow DTBE to answer Office of Management and Budget and HHS data calls. Phil also conducted regular project analysis meetings to determine the progress of specific DTBE IT investments; excelled in preparing project documentation and other required materials, including those needed for the assessment and evaluation stages of IT project development; reviewed "Work Breakdown Structures" and prioritization criteria prior to and during IT project development and deployment; presented IT project schedule and performance baselines to the DTBE business steward for approval; intervened to prevent slippage of cost and schedule projections; and effectively participated in postdevelopment review of IT projects. Phil was promoted to the position of Team Leader for the Public Health Information Network (PHIN) Support Section of the Alliance Management and Consultation Division of the National Center for Public Health Informatics (NCPHI), effective June 26, 2006. We will sorely miss him here at DTBE and wish him the best as he faces new challenges in his public health career. Ann M. Buff, MD, MPH, who attended Dunwoody High School, Atlanta, and received a BA degree in history from the University of Notre Dame, joins the Surveillance, Epidemiology, and Outbreak Investigations Branch (SEOIB) on July 31 as its new EIS Officer. In 1997 she received her MD degree from Indiana University of Medicine in Indianapolis, and in 2003 she received her MPH degree from Tulane University in New Orleans. She comes to CDC from the Navy, where she has been a Preventive Medicine Officer and a Flight Surgeon. Christine Robinette (“Robin”) Curtis, MD, MPH, has left DTBE and accepted an Atlanta-based position with CDC’s National Center for Immunization and Respiratory Diseases, effective April 1, 2006. This move was an exciting one for Robin as it will allow her to continue and complete work related to vaccine-preventable diseases and will also permit her to be closer to her family. As a U.S. Public Health Service Commissioned Officer assigned through DTBE to the TB Control Branch (TBCB) of the California Department of Health Services (CDHS), Robin served as Chief of the Outbreak Prevention and Control Section (OPCS), which was launched in July 2005 shortly after Robin’s formal transfer to the assignment. In addition to other roles and responsibilities, she supervised the CDHS Multidrug-Resistant TB (MDR TB) Service, which is dedicated to the enhanced detection, treatment, and management of MDR TB cases throughout California. Robin earned her medical degree at the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill in 1995. From 2001 through 2003 she served as an EIS officer with the National Immunization Program. From 2003 to 2004 Robin completed CDC’s Preventive Medicine Residency Program, during which time she earned an MPH degree at Emory University, and she served in a practicum assignment with California’s TBCB from 2004 to 2005. Andrea (Annie) Hoopes has joined DTBE as the first CDC Experience Fellow assigned to the Surveillance, Epidemiology, and Outbreak Investigations Branch (SEOIB). Annie was one of eight medical students chosen from among 50 who competed for this 1-year applied epidemiology fellowship. Annie graduated magna cum laude from Washington University in St. Louis, Missouri, where she majored in Classics and Humanities. She is presently a second-year medical student at the Ohio State University School of Medicine and Public Health. Annie spent four consecutive summers working on adolescent health research and school-based prevention programming through Case Western University’s Center for Adolescent Health, and has co-authored a publication on the impact of adolescent spirituality on depressive symptoms and health risk behaviors. Annie is interested in health disparities research as well as international health. She plans to pursue a career in internal medicine, public health, and infectious diseases. Annie speaks and writes Swedish, Italian, and Spanish. Funded by a grant from Pfizer Inc, the “CDC Experience: Applied Epidemiology” fellowship at CDC provides medical students with an applied hands-on training experience in epidemiology and public health. Up to 10 competitively selected third- and fourth-year medical students from around the country spend up to 1 full year at CDC in Atlanta, Georgia. While at CDC, with the guidance of experienced CDC epidemiologists, they carry out epidemiologic analyses in areas such as birth defects, injury, chronic disease, infectious disease, environmental health, reproductive health and minority health. Heather Joseph, MPH, left DTBE in June for a position in the Division of HIV/AIDS Prevention (DHAP). Heather is joining the Prevention Research Branch as a Behavioral Scientist on the Individual and Small Group Interventions Team. Heather joined DTBE’s Clinical and Health Systems Research Branch (CHSRB) first as an ASPH fellow and became a Health Scientist on the Health Systems Research team a year later. During her 5 years with CHSRB, Heather made significant contributions to numerous projects. The first was her involvement in a study assessing health care workers’ adherence to TB treatment policies and protocols, which culminated in a publication in the American Journal of Infection Control for which she was lead author. With a background in anthropology, Heather contributed to the writing of a TB chapter in the Encyclopedia of Medical Anthropology, which involved an extensive literature review of the historical contributions made by the field of anthropology and other social sciences to TB control. One of her biggest projects was the ethnographic study of perceptions of TB among five foreign-born groups in the U.S., for which Heather served as co-PI, substantially contributing to the design, development, implementation, analysis, and reporting of the findings. Reporting has been via site reports, oral and poster presentations at professional meetings, and manuscripts that are in progress. Heather has also made valuable contributions to the development of TBESC Task Order 13 LTBI study of factors associated with acceptance and adherence. One of only a few other social scientists on the study team, Heather helped conceptualize Phase 3 of the study and develop the numerous data collection instruments. She also actively planned and participated in implementing the interviewer and piloting trainings for the 12 participating study sites. Heather also co-led a collaborative study with HRSA to enhance TB testing and treatment practices among HIV service providers. The project involved analyzing data from Ryan White Care Act funded providers and developing a study protocol to conduct in-depth case studies among 6 selected HIV clinics. Additionally, Heather led a project to access Marketscan, an administrative claims and encounter database from the private health care sector, to determine its utility for TB health services research. In addition to her research contributions, Heather played an active role in the development and implementation of activities led by the Evaluation Working Group. Besides helping to develop and deliver program evaluation trainings, Heather served as a member of the Evaluation Tools Team, where she assisted in collecting and assessing evaluation tools used by TB programs. Heather also contributed greatly to the development of the strategic evaluation plan, the TB Program Evaluation Handbook, and the Introduction to Program Evaluation for Public Health Programs. Finally, during her time at DTBE, Heather was offered the exciting opportunity with the International Experience and Technical Assistance program. She spent 3 months in Addis Ababa, Ethiopia working with the CDC-Ethiopia Associate Director of Science to develop a research agenda and build capacity in their local human research protections system. We will surely miss Heather’s outstanding contributions and her ever-cheerful, spirited character. Heather Lynch, MD, MPH, (soon to be Heather Menzies) will be joining the International Research and Programs Branch (IRPB) in August as its new EIS Officer. She arrives in Atlanta from Seattle, where she is working as a primary care pediatrician in public health at King County, and a project development advisor for the University of Washington Child Health Institute. Heather attended the University of North Carolina, Chapel Hill, and graduated with a BA degree in biology and anthropology in 1992, finished her medical degree at the Yale University School of Medicine in 1998, and also received her MPH degree from the University of Washington in Seattle. She has received numerous awards for community service, and comes to DTBE with an interest in pediatric tuberculosis. Scott McNabb, PhD, leaves DTBE on July 21 for a new position in CDC. He has been named the new Director, Division of Integrated Surveillance Systems and Services (DISSS), National Center for Public Health Informatics (NCPHI), Coordinating Center for Health Information and Service (CoCHIS). As Director of DISSS, he will lead CDC’s efforts to identify, assess, and pursue national and international solutions to integrated surveillance and response efforts. While at DTBE, he led a related effort under Task Order #10 to identify, assess, and pursue integrated and user-friendly monitoring and evaluation tools for TB at the county and state levels. As Director of DISSS, Scott will also lead CDC’s efforts to develop, implement, and maintain common platforms, agency-wide systems, and applications for integrated solutions, including those for integrated surveillance, lab reporting, and response. He will lead the existing NEDSS, NNDSS/NETSS/NNDSS-link, and Epi Info activities, as well as the LRN Real Time Laboratory Information Exchange, the Specimen Tracking and Results Reporting System (STARRS), and the Coordinating Systems for Managing Outbreaks and Health Events (OMS). Since many of these efforts directly impact DTBE, we are happy to have someone who knows about tuberculosis in this leadership position. Cheryl Scott, MD, has accepted a position as a DTBE/FSEB medical officer in the California Department of Health Services (CDHS). She comes to DTBE with 13 years of CDC experience in the areas of HIV/AIDS and global health, reproductive and child health services, program evaluation, and disaster epidemiology. From 1993 to 1995, Dr. Scott served in CDC’s Epidemic Intelligence Service program while assigned to the CDHS Maternal and Child Health section, and later worked for 3 years as New Jersey’s State Maternal and Child Health epidemiologist. While at CDC headquarters, Dr. Scott led an update of postneonatal mortality surveillance and developed an evaluation strategy for the Guide to Community Preventive Services. During 2000-2005, while working with CDC’s Global AIDS Program and the President’s Emergency Plan For AIDS Relief, Dr. Scott established an in-country CDC office and directed an HIV/AIDS infrastructure development, care, and treatment program in the United Republic of Tanzania and Zanzibar. Prior to joining CDC, Dr. Scott provided clinical services to underserved populations in New York City and the U.S. Virgin Islands and worked on global health projects in Africa and India. Dr. Scott received her BA degree from the University of California at Santa Cruz and her medical degree from Boston University School of Medicine. She completed residencies in internal medicine at UCLA/Charles Drew-King Hospital in Los Angeles and in preventive medicine while at CDC. She received an MPH degree in international health from Johns Hopkins University School of Hygiene and Public Health. Dr. Scott has published in the areas of maternal and child health, disaster epidemiology, and HIV/AIDS. Cheryl Tryon, MS, joined DTBE on June 12 as a Health Education Specialist in the Communications, Education, and Behavioral Studies Branch. Cheryl has over 25 years of experience in designing, developing, evaluating, and implementing health education and training materials. She began working at CDC in 1987, first in the Public Health Practice Program Office (PHPPO), Division of Professional Development and Evaluation, then in the Global AIDS Program (GAP). Prior to coming to CDC, she developed health education materials for medical schools in Texas. Cheryl received her MS degree in Biomedical Communications from the University of Texas Health Science Center at Houston, and a BA degree in Art/Art Education from the University of South Florida, Tampa. Cheryl is no stranger to our Division. While in PHPPO, she worked on the original Self-Study Modules on Tuberculosis that were distributed nationally, and the supporting distance learning satellite broadcast entitled "Satellite Primer on Tuberculosis" back in 1995. She also worked with us on the supplemental Self-Study Modules and the Web-Based Self-Study Modules on Tuberculosis course. While in GAP, she worked with DTBE staff to develop and provide a train-the-trainer course in Botswana on implementation of routine HIV testing in the TB program. And earlier this year, she taught a TB program train-the-trainer class in Russia with CEBSB staff. Many of the projects she has worked on have won international, national, and CDC awards for excellence in health education materials, including the Freddy award and the International Society for Performance Improvement award which were for joint projects with DTBE. Holly Wilson, MHSE, CHES, has joined the Communications, Education, and Behavioral Studies Branch as a Health Education Specialist. Holly will be working with Maria Fraire on the Communications Team. Holly comes to DTBE from the Division of Viral Hepatitis (DVH) where she was also a Health Education Specialist. In DVH, Holly served as the acting team lead and her responsibilities included designing, implementing, and evaluating viral hepatitis education and communication campaigns for health professionals and the general public, and monitoring cooperative agreements. She received a BS degree in Health Science Education and a Master of Health Science Education degree from the University of Florida.
Last Reviewed: 05/18/2008 |
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