Course Leaders
Dr. Ahluwalia is a physician and public health scientist at Brown University. He has been in academic medicine since 1992, with his primary research areas are health disparities and smoking cessation and nicotine addiction in African-American smokers. He has been continuously funded by NIH for 25 years and has published more than 350 manuscripts. Dr. Ahluwalia is currently appointed to the federal government’s Interagency Committee on Smoking and Health chaired by the US Surgeon General.
Dr. Camp is a Professor in the Department of Internal Medicine and serves as the Director of the Utah Population Database (UPDB). Her research focuses on risk and prognosis in common cancers, and includes both development of novel statistical genetic and genomic approaches and their application in discovery studies. She is involved in large collaborative genetic and epidemiological studies, has led international consortia, and co-leads a translational science training program.
Dr. Cheng is an Associate Professor of Medicine at Henry Ford Health in Detroit, Michigan. His research examines the biopsychosocial dimensions of sleep and circadian disorders. Dr. Cheng is also experienced in facilitating research mentor training and has specific interests in cultivating culturally aware and responsive mentoring, with curricular expertise in the Culturally Aware Mentoring module offered via NRMN. He is developing curriculum that target issues specific to LGBT+ communities.
Dr. Curtin is an Associate Professor at the UofU, and joined the Huntsman Cancer Institute (HCI) Pedigree & Population Resource in 2010. She also serves as Associate Director of the Utah Population Database (UPDB). She collaborates widely with investigators across healthcare and academic institutions - recently with the BrightFocus(R) Foundation's National Glaucoma Research Program to study prognostic factors and predictive markers of progression to exfoliation glaucoma.
Dr. Fagan is a Professor and Director of the Center for the Study of Tobacco in the Fay W. Boozman College of Public Health, University of Arkansas for Medical Sciences. She collaborates with diverse disciplines and has lead NIH-funded projects and programs including: the Center for the Study of Tobacco Products, the Arkansas Center for Health Disparities, the Arkansas Community Engagement Alliance Against COVID-19 Disparities, and the Center for Research, Health, & Social Justice.
Dr. Hanson is a Senior Scientist and Group Lead at Oak Ridge National Laboratory. She is a demographer and life course epidemiologist, with expertise in analysis of population health data. She is the technical lead of a joint NCI- DOE Modeling Outcomes and is involved in a project investigating suicide and opioid overdose mortality using Veteran’s Administration (VA) data through the VICTOR project. Her previous projects have utilized large health databases such as the UPDB, NHANES, and SEER.
Dr. Hashibe is a Professor at the UofU, Director of Research and Practice for the Division of Public Health, an HCI investigator, and Director of Research Facilitation and Integration for the UCR. She is the Scientific Coordinator and one of the founding members of the INHANCE Consortium. Her studies include a head and neck cancer genetics study, a multicenter head and neck cancer study in East Asia, a lung and head and neck cancer study in Nepal, and a Rural Cancer Survivors study in Utah.
Kim Herget, MStat is an expert biostatistician for the Utah Cancer Registry (UCR). She conducts statistical analysis, including frequencies, rates, regressions, and survival models, and also writes SAS code to complete data linkages using a variety of statistical software from numerous external data sources. Kim has served on several state-wide analytic committees and workgroups. Her responsibilities include verifying the accuracy of linkages, correcting discrepancies, and updating databases.
Dr. Kirchhoff is a tenured Associate Professor of Pediatrics at the UofU and a Huntsman Cancer Institute Investigator in the Cancer Control and Population Sciences Research Program. As a health services researcher, her program primarily concerns evaluating patient outcomes related to healthcare access and cancer late effects, and developing interventions for childhood, adolescent, and young adult cancer survivors, with a focus on addressing the social and financial consequences of cancer.
Dr. Lee is an Adjunct Assistant Professor for the UofU, a Huntsman Cancer Institute (HCI) investigator, and a member of the Cancer Control and Population Sciences program. Lee's research focuses on how and why cancer develops in the general population. She studies risk factors and prognostic factors for smoking-related cancers, and her research goal is to identify cancer-preventing habits, and eventually ingrain healthy practices that reduce cancer risk and improve the lives of cancer patients.
Dr. Ma is Associate Dean for Health Disparities, Founding Director of Center for Asian Health, Laura H. Carnell Professor at Temple University and Primary Member of Fox Chase Cancer Center of Temple University Health System. She is a nationally recognized behavioral health scientist and a leader and pioneer in cancer and health disparities research. She has mentored over 260 diverse mentees aiming to help create a pipeline to a more diverse workforce of researchers in health disparities.
Dr. McGee is the Associate Dean for Professional Development at Northwestern University Feinberg School of Medicine. His primary aim is to support development of the independent research programs of early career faculty utilizing a novel grant writing coaching group process he developed over the past 20 years. Dr. McGee is also deeply involved with the National Research Mentoring Network (NRMN) with new approaches to teaching and studying culturally aware mentoring and grant writing skills.
Dr. Okuyemi is PI for the NCI-Funded Advanced Course and Professor, Chair for the Indiana University Department of Family Medicine, and Associate Dean for Health Equity Research at IU. With over 20 years of experience as an effective executive leader and researcher, he has focused on research and training programs that improve the health of underserved populations and elimination health disparities and inequities using community-engaged research alongside pharmacological and culturally tailored behavioral interventions.
Dr. Resnicow is the Irwin Rosenstock Professor of Health Behavior and Health Education at University of Michigan, the Associate Director for Community Engagement and Health Disparities Research at the University of Michigan Rogel Cancer Center, and Chief Scientific Lead at the University’s Center for Health Communications Research. His work focuses on designing and evaluating behavior change programs for a wide range of health behaviors, and much of his work has involved underserved populations.
Tony Tsai, MBA is the Director of Career and Leadership Develop for University of Utah Health Sciences. He helps people connect to their purpose in their careers through coaching and leadership training. In previous roles, he has led strategic transformation efforts in medical education at the University of Michigan Medical School and UofU Medical School. He was a former officer in the U.S. Army and holds an MBA from Columbia Business School and an BBA from the Wharton School of Business.
Dr. Ulrich is the Executive Director of the Comprehensive Cancer Center at Huntsman Cancer Institute (HCI). She is also a Jon M. and Karen Huntsman Presidential Professor in Cancer Research in the Department of Population Health Sciences at the University of Utah. She is an epidemiologist who focuses on lifestyle and biologic factors in cancer prevention and prognosis. As Chief Scientific Officer and Cancer Center Executive Director, Dr. Ulrich oversees more than 230 cancer research teams.