Epidemiology & Biostatistics

Field Experience Poster Presentation for Fall 2008. Left to Right:Amy Borenstein and Xiaohon Li; Jill Weber and Anne DeMuth; Alek Wang, Yougui Wu and Yangxin Huang,Craig McKinnon and Stephanie Kolar
	September 2009 USF Awarded a Summer Institute for Training in Biostatistics by NIH Researchers from Department of Epidemiology and Biostatistics have been awarded a 3-year, $800K grant from the National Heart, Lung, and Blood Institute to establish a Summer Institute for Training in Biostatistics. Led by Dr. Yiliang Zhu with Drs. G. Dagne, Huang, Salihu, and Wu, the success of the USF team is the result of collaboration among researchers from Colleges of Public Health, Medicine, Nursing, Moffitt Cancer Center, Jaeb Center for Health Research, and Tampa VA hospital. USF’s summer institute is a part of the national efforts to train next generation of biostatistical scientists with a 6-week, all-expense-paid program for students interested in pursuing a career in biostistics or related field.
	August 2009 Dr. Hamisu Salihu and Collegues Publish Article Salihu HM, Luke S, Alio AP, Deutsch A, Marty PJ. The impact of obesity on spontaneous and medically indicated preterm birth among adolescent mothers. Archives of Gynecology and Obstetrics. 2009 Aug 26. PUBMED ID: 19707780
	July 2009 Field Experience Debriefing and Poster Session Jamila Ealey (left), Nellie Darbinyan, Judy Jackson, Helen Georgiev, Lissa Fahlman, Reina Patel, Selina Radlein, Shawn Hirsch, and Matthew Roach participated in the summer poster session. Click Here to view more photograhs.

April 24, 2009 Students and faculty enjoyed the spring Field Experience Debriefing and pot-luck luncheon Students presenting their Field Experience work in poster format were, from left to right: Ashley Cole (Epi), Kimberly Davis (Epi), Talat Almukhtar (Epi), William (Andy) Lapcevic (Biostats), Bambi Arnold (Epi), and Peiyao Cheng (Biostats) not pictured.
	April 1, 2009 Award Recipients at Annual Public Health Awards Ceremony As Part of National Public Health Week the College of Public Health Annual Awards Ceremony was held Wednesday, April 1^st in the College Auditorium. The department of Epidemiology and Biostatistics recipients included both students and faculty. Leigh Mathias, a doctoral student in Epidemiology, received a Student Research Scholarship. Student Honorary Awards for Research and Practice (SHARP awards) went to Stephanie Kolar, Michelle Iannacone and Beibei Lu, Doctoral Students in Epidemiology and to Natasha Sobers-Grannum, a Masters Degree student in Epidemiology. The Lea Leavengood Senior Program Endowed Scholarship went the Yang Ji, a Dual Biostatistics Masters and Aging Studies Doctoral student. Inductees into Delta Omega from the department included Graduates Shandey Malcolm (MPH Dual Epidemiology and Biostatistics), Michelle Nash (MPH Epidemiology) and Faculty member Wendy Nembhard, Ph.D. Elizabeth Barnett Pathak, Ph.D. was named the 2009 COPH Outstanding Professor. Congratulations to all the award recipients. Top Picture: Elizabeth Barnett Pathak, recipient of the 2009 COPH Outstanding Professor Award with student Selina Radlein Middle Picture: SHARP award recipients Michelle Iannacone and Beibei Lu Bottom Picture: Dean Donna Peterson with award winner Yang Ji
	April 2009 Dr. Yangxin Huang Receives Grant from NIH for Project on Statistical Methods for Long-Term HIV Modeling and Design Yangxin Huang, PhD, Assistant Professor in the Department of Epidemiology and Biostatistics received a notice of R03 grant award from NIH with total cost of $145,000 for September 2009 to August 2011. The project is to study HIV/AIDS mechanism-based system of nonlinear ordinary differential equations with time-varying drug efficacy and corresponding statistical methods in evaluating protocol designs used in AIDS clinical trials for their effectiveness in generating desired clinical outcomes.
	March 27, 2009 Doctoral Student Receives Outstanding Graduate Student Award Beibei Lu, a doctoral student in the Department of Epidemiology and Biostatistics received an Outstanding Graduate Student Award. Nominated by Dr. Heather Stockwell, Chair of the Department, The award was presented at the Graduate Student Awards Banquet on Friday March 27, 2009 at the Marshall Center.
	January, 2009 The Department of Epidemiology & Biostatistics Welcomes Visiting Scholar! Dr. Weian Du, PhD in Econometrics, is an associate professor at Wuhan University of Technology (WHUT) in China has joined Department of Epidemiology & Biostatistics at COPH as a visiting scholar for one year. Dr. Du has 13 year's experience teaching econometrics, health insurance, and security and investment analysis for graduate & undergraduate students. His research interests focus on econometric statistics, health insurance and risk analysis. Dr. Du will be working closely with Dr. Yangxin Huang to develop collaborative research agent on statistical applications to health economics, finance and health insurance.
	October 29, 2008 Study focuses on PTSD and pregnancy in military women Kathleen O’Rourke, PhD, professor of epidemiology, and Elizabeth Barnett Pathak, PhD, associate professor of epidemiology, were awarded the 18-month, $214,357 contract from the Department of Defense to study the impact of post traumatic stress disorder (PTSD) on the pregnancy outcomes of women in the military has been funded as part of the Pentagon’s unprecedented $300-million initiative to study PTSD and traumatic brain injury.
	October 3, 2008 USF joins NIH's landmark National Children's Study USF was awarded $28.8 million to oversee the NIH-sponsored National Children’s Study research contract in Hillsborough and Orange counties for the first five years of a 20-year study to investigating how genetic and environmental factors influence childhood health and disease. Perinatal epidemiologists Wendy Nembhard, PhD, (left) and Kathleen O'Rourke, PhD, supported by faculty across the USF College of Public Health, worked behind the scenes for four years to ensure USF had a major role in this study.
	August 27, 2008 Four USF Health professors receive University's highest honor & Dr. C. Hendricks Brown Selected as Distinguished USF Health Professor Dr. Hendricks Brown has been selected as a Distinguished USF Health Professor for 2008! Dr. Brown is an internationally renowned expert in prevention methodology research, a field he is credited with helping to develop. Much of Dr. Brown’s research has been in partnership with leading Prevention Research Centers funded by the National Institutes of Mental Health and the National Institute on Drug Abuse.
	August 19, 2008 Dr. Salihu leads state initiative to tackle black infant mortality A leading researcher in the field of infant mortality, Dr. Salihu is a key player in a statewide Black Infant Health Practice collaborative to address the racial gap in infant deaths in Florida and to recommend policy changes at the local and state levels. Black infants are more than twice as likely as white infants to die before their first birthday, and the racial disparity gap in infant mortality is widening. This disproportionate burden is a major problem in Florida, where the death rates for black infants climbed between 2000 and 2004, defying an overall national decline.
	June 9, 2008 Mother's obesity a factor in newborn deaths for blacks, not whites A study led by the University of South Florida sheds new light on obesity’s role in the black-white gap in infant mortality. In a report in the June 2008 issue of the journal Obstetrics & Gynecology. “Even if the infant of an obese black woman survives pregnancy, labor and delivery, that baby is at greater risk of dying than a baby born to an obese white woman,” said the study’s lead author Hamisu Salihu, MD, PhD, associate professor of epidemiology at the USF College of Public Health. Infants of obese black mothers had a higher risk of death in the first 27 days following birth than newborns of obese white mothers.
	April 16, 2008 Dr. Aurora Sanchez-Anguiano presents at American Association of Cancer Research meeting Dr. Aurora Sanchez-Anguiano presented a poster titled “A Study of Lung Cancer in Florida: Gender and Ethnic Differences 1981- 2003” at the annual meeting of the American Association for Cancer Research in San Diego, April 12-16, 2006. Other authors on the poster were Drs. L. Rajaram, Heather G. Stockwell, and doctoral student Vonetta Williams.
	April 3, 2008 New York Times Interviews USF Public Health Expert on Stillbirths Writers for the New York Times interviewed USF Faculty member Hamisu Salihu, MD, PhD, as a world expert on stillbirth for the April 1, 2008 article entitled “Seeking Answers to Stop Another Stillbirth”. The New York Times story appeared in the publication’s Personal Health section. Dr. Salihu, archer and Associate Professor of Epidemiology in the USF College of Public Health, was interviewed regarding the importance of fetal autopsies, given the limited research that exist to date on the causes of stillbirth.
	March 16, 2008 Stephanie Kolar Presents Poster at International Conference Stephanie Kolar, a doctoral student in Epidemiology, presented a poster titled Laboratory analysis of Staphylococcus aureus in Florida: January 1, 2003 to December 31, 2005 with an Emphasis on Methicillin Resistance” at the International Conference on Emerging Infectious Disease held in Atlanta, GA March 16-19, 2008. Other authors on the poster included: EPB Faculty member Dr. Aurora Sanchez-Anguiano; Epidemiology and Biostatistics Dual MPH student Shandey Malcolm; and Roger Sanderson, MS, RN, Regional Epidemiologist, Florida Department of Health, Bureau of Epidemiology.

June 9, 2008