Faculty News

SMS Welcomes New Faculty

Sociomedical Sciences’ Division Head Cheryl Healton, Dr.P.H., recently welcomed an outstanding group of new faculty members, citing the diversity and breadth of talents and perspective that they bring to the School and its students.

The new faculty members are:

Raymond Arons, Dr.P.H., M.P.H., assistant professor and Director of the Sociomedical Sciences Health Data Library and director of Student Practicum. Arons analyzes large-scale health data sets, collaborating with physician and hospital providers on national, state, and local levels with a focus on health services research.

Alwyn Cohall, M.D., assistant professor, is director of the Division of Adolescent Medicine at St. Luke’s/Roosevelt Hospital Center, as well as director of the Harlem Center for Health Promotion and Disease Prevention, a joint project of Harlem Hospital Center and the School of Public Health [see related article].

Amy L. Fairchild, Ph.D., M.P.H., assistant professor, recently joined the faculty of SMS’ new Program in the History of Public Health and Medicine.

Joyce Moon Howard, Dr.P.H., assistant professor, is director of professional education at the Charles P. Felton National Tuberculosis Center at Harlem Hospital Center, one of three CDC-funded National TB Centers.

Gerald Oppenheimer, Ph.D., M.P.H., associate professor of clinical public health, has written extensively on the ethical, political and historical implications of the AIDS epidemic, focusing on its impact on epidemiology, the gay community, health insurance and health services research.

Richard Parker, Ph.D., associate professor, has carried out long-term research on gender, sexuality and health in Brazil, as well as on the international HIV/AIDS epidemic.

Jo Phelan, Ph.D., assistant professor, completed a post-doctoral fellowship in CSPH’s Psychiatric Epidemiology Training Program. She has been a faculty member in the Departments of Sociology at UCLA and the University of Southern California.

Randall Sell, Sc.D., assistant professor, has been involved with numerous AHCPR- and HRSA-funded HIV/AIDS projects and is currently an investigator with the Special Projects of National Significance.

Ruby Senie, Ph.D., professor of clinical public health, is an epidemiologist with a focus on breast cancer research [see Cancer story, page 22]. Earlier in her career Senie was director of Community Medicine at Beth Israel Medical Center in New York where she participated in studies of breast cancer and AIDS.

In other SMS news, John Allegrante, Ph.D., has been named president of the Society for Public Health Education. The Society is an international, non-profit professional organization that promotes the health of all people through education and publishes the journal Health Education and Behavior.

The Harlem Longitudinal Study of Black Youth, headed by Ann Brunswick, Ph.D., is among only ten studies chosen by the Radcliffe institute for its prestigious Conference on Life Course Studies: Landmark Studies of the Twentieth Century.

Donald Gemson. M.D., M.P.H., in a new member of the Board of Regents, representing the northeast region, of the American College of Preventive Medicine, and Division Head Cheryl Healton, Dr. P.H., has been elected to the Board of Regents of the American College of Preventive Medicine.

Denise B. Kandel, Ph.D., received renewal of her Research Scientist Award from the National institute on Drug Abuse.

Corrine Kirchner, Ph.D., a lecturer in the Division, is the 1997 recipient of the George E. Keane Award from the New York State chapter of the association for Education and Rehabilitation of the Blind and Visually Impaired.

Nancy Van Devanter, Dr. P.H., is heading a distance education initiative aimed at making curriculum improvements and developing a M.P.H. degree program utilizing distance learning approaches. She is conducting her work with the support of a three-year Health Research and Services Administration Special Projects grant.