Graduate programs at USF Health had promising gains in this year’s rankings from U.S. News & World Report (U.S. News), with some programs breaking into the top 50 of their rankings.

In the U.S. News 2024 Best Graduate Schools list released on April 25, USF Health’s physician assistant, nursing and public health programs ranked among the best in the country.

The rankings released April 25 did not include medical schools or law schools; those rankings were released by U.S. News May 11.

Among the notable advancements this year are the two graduate programs from the USF Health College of Nursing, each of which had major gains, and the Physician Assistant Program in the USF Health Morsani College of Medicine, which made the ranking list for the first time in its young history after receiving its inaugural full accreditation needed to qualify.

“Our nursing school is clearly garnering attention on the national stage as both its master’s and doctoral programs are making incredible gains in the rankings, and proving to be the best in Florida,” said Charles J. Lockwood, MD, MHCM, executive vice president of USF Health and dean of the USF Health Morsani College of Medicine. “And the first-time ranking for our physician assistant program marks a significant milestone. While this USF Health program is still young, its inaugural ranking is among the top third of PA programs across the country. We anticipate further rankings gains as our program continues to develop.”

According to U.S. News, its methodology uses data from expert opinions and statistical indicators when measuring a program’s ranking, examining qualities students and faculty bring to the educational experience and graduates’ achievements linked to their degrees, such as job placement and research impact.

The posted results for USF Health this year include:

• #46 in Medical Schools for Primary Care: The USF Health Morsani College of Medicine improved significantly for U.S. medical schools for primary care, going from #56 last year to #46 this year, and breaking into the top 50 for the first time.
• #50 in Medical Schools for Research: The Morsani College of Medicine continues to rank well among U.S. medical schools for research, ranking at #50 this year.
• #65 in Health Doctoral Programs – Physician Assistant: The Morsani College of Medicine’s Physician Assistant program ranked for the first time, ranked at #65 this year, placing it in the top third of the more than 200 PA programs in the rankings.
• #31 in Nursing for Master’s: The USF Health College of Nursing jumped 11 spots, going from #42 last year to #31 this year, making it the top-ranked public nursing master’s program in Florida.
• #33 in Nursing for DNP: The College of Nursing also continues to improve in its DNP program ranking and skyrocketed into the top 50 for doctoral programs in the country with its 34-spot jump from #67 last year to #33 this year, making it the top-ranked public or private DNP program in Florida.
• #22 in Public Health: The USF Health College of Public Health remains the top-ranked public health program in Florida, with its rank at #22 this year.

U.S. News does not provide new rankings for all graduate programs each year, so the USF Health Taneja College of Pharmacy maintains its rank of #68, and the School of Physical Therapy and Rehabilitation Sciences maintains its rank of #49.

More on rankings for other USF graduate programs…

This years’ top news and social media stories feature a little bit of everything – and it’s not all about COVID-19.  Broken records, emotional patient stories, advances in research, multitalented physicians, and other big news from around USF Health fill the list.

Take a look at the top USF Health online and social media stories of 2021.

Top USF Health Online Stories*

1:  USF Health selected as a clinical trial site for Moderna COVID-19 vaccine for children six months to 11 years old.

2:  Michael Teng’s Q&A behind the MRNA COVID-19 vaccines.

3:  USF Health receives a five-year, $44 million grant to test if computerized brain training can reduce the risk of dementia.

4:  USF Health researchers suggest the natural compound in basil may protect against Alzheimer’s.

5:  USF Health conducted an NIH study of allergic reactions to various COVID19 vaccines

6:  The USF Health Morsani College of Medicine welcomed the most academically competitive and diverse class of medical students.

7:  COVID-19 couldn’t put a damper on the excitement of Match Day 2021.

8:  A USF Health emergency medicine resident became a Grammy Award-winning opera choir singer.

9:  USF was awarded a four-year, $69.9 million NIH grant for type-1 diabetes research.

Jeffery Krischer, PhD, is principal investigator of the TEDDY study.

10:  In the wake of a global pandemic, USF Health returned to full operations.

*Page views on the USF Health News WordPress site as determined by Google Analytics

Top 10 Social Media Stories*

1: USF Health selected as a clinical trial site for Moderna COVID-19 vaccine for children six months to 11 years old.

2: USF Health researchers suggest the natural compound in basil may protect against Alzheimer’s.

3: The USF Health Morsani College of Medicine class of 2024 receive their first white coats.

4: USF Health Morsani College of Medicine welcome the most academically competitive and diverse class in history.

5: USF Health physicians treat car enthusiast with ENT cancer.

Allen Parent, of Brookville, Fla., was diagnosed with squamous cell mouth cancer, a head and neck cancer, and referred for treatment to Dr. Matthew Mifsud, a USF Health head and neck surgeon and otolaryngologist, and Dr. Julia Toman, a USF Health facial plastic surgeon.

6: USF Health neurosurgeons repair spine for thrill-seeking patient. 

7: Our USF Health physicians make the top doctors list.

8:  USF Health patient makes $25,000 gift to USF Health IBD center

9: USF Health emergency medicine resident became a Grammy Award-winning opera choir singer.

10: Taneja College of Pharmacy announces their move to downtown Tampa.

**Based on Facebook page views

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TAMPA, Fla. (July 23, 2021)– New data provided by University of South Florida College of Public Health epidemiologist Edwin Michael, PhD, and colleague Ken Newcomb shows that there’s been a 70 percent drop in the rate of people getting vaccinated in Hillsborough County since April. There are currently 2,000 people receiving the vaccine each day. Unless that figure doubles, Michael says that control of the resurgence of the pandemic over this fall will not be achieved.

“The upsurge in cases and hospitalizations are due to fewer vaccinations, relaxation of social distancing measures, greater population mobility, plus the spread of more contagious variants, which are also slightly better in evading immunity and likely cause more symptomatic disease compared to the original variant.” Michael said. “These predictions warn that until vaccination rates are ramped up to achieve herd immunity over this fall, people will still need to follow social distancing measures, such as wearing face coverings at the very least, to protect themselves and to reduce infection spread.”

Michael’s SEIRcast COVID-19 Forecast and Planning Portal shows that the slowing of vaccination since April combined with a steady reduction in the practice of social mitigation measures and the spread of the highly contagious alpha and delta variants will lead to a new spike in cases by mid-September, with 2,800 cases reported in Hillsborough County each day. The size of the spike with be three times greater than that observed during the second wave observed last winter.

Edwin Michael, PhD, is a USF Health College of Public Health epidemiologist who studies the spread and control of global infectious diseases.

He expects this September spike to be the final wave of the pandemic, which will primarily occur within the unvaccinated population. However, this will prompt a new surge in hospitalizations, potentially exceeding hospital bed capacity.

While there have been some infections reported by vaccinated individuals, their cases have been relatively mild, with very few requiring hospitalization. Nearly 48 percent of the population in Florida has been fully vaccinated. Michael says we will not reach herd immunity until that figure increases to 85 percent. This is higher than previous projections due to the prevalence of dominant variants. He says the next two months are crucial in trying to put an end to the pandemic.

USF Health students, staff and faculty during a White Coats 4 Black Lives demonstration outside of the USF Health Morsani Center, in June 2020.

In December 2020, Susan Moore, MD, an Indiana physician, died of COVID-19 after alleging she experienced racial discrimination while undergoing treatment at a hospital operated by Indiana University Health System. “Moore’s story of her pain being dismissed reinforces what studies have repeatedly shown: Even taking wealth, education and insurance status into account, Black patients receive worse medical care and face worse outcomes,” a Washington Post article on Dr. Moore’s death said.

Just one month before Dr. Moore’s death, the Association of American Medical Colleges (AAMC) shared an article that touched on a 2016 study published in the Proceedings of the National Academies of Science which included a survey that revealed that 40% of first- and second-year medical students endorsed the belief that “Black people’s skin is thicker than white people’s.” The study also showed that the trainees who believed this myth were less likely to treat Black people’s pain appropriately.

This article brought to light the continued need for institutions to address racial bias in healthcare starting with health education. USF Health is doing its part by building curriculums that teach the next generation of health care providers about social determinants of health and how to provide value-based and patient-centered care, and recruiting and retaining the diverse educators to teach it.

“Your goal as the practitioner is to truly understand who the patient is and all of the different aspects of the patient which may have some impact on their medical care,” Deborah DeWaay, MD, FACP, associate dean of undergraduate medical education for USF Health Morsani College of Medicine (MCOM), said. “It helps the provider battle unconscious bias because when they individuate patients in their mind, they’re less likely to give biased care.”

In 2016, MCOM started focusing on incorporating course objectives that examine prejudice, assumptions and privilege, such as Safe Zone training and poverty simulation activities. In 2019, Shirley Smith, MA, director of student diversity and enrichment for MCOM, became the College’s integration director for cultural competency. Using the AAMC’s objectives for cultural competency, Smith spent hundreds of hours reviewing the entire MCOM curriculum, and will continue to do so on an annual basis, highlighting places where the objectives were not being met to the highest level. These findings were then presented to the curriculum committee who make the final decision about changes to curriculum and if approved, provide recommendations for moving forward. In addition, Smith provided feedback to faculty about where there may be bias within the didactics. “It’s been really refreshing to have faculty embrace this and leadership like Dr. Lockwood, support this,” Smith said. Students also have the ability to provide real-time feedback to Smith and her team via an anonymous survey. “What we’re really trying to do is not have any judgement attached to the feedback,” Dr. DeWaay said. “We’re trying to create a method for our faculty who are teaching, to deal with their unconscious bias in a safe environment.”

USF College of Public Health Dean Donna Petersen, participating in the 2019 poverty simulation along with other USF Health deans, faculty, staff and students. Pre-Covid Photo.

MCOM is also in the process of partnering with Wake Forest University in North Carolina to create curriculum that can be used at both universities in order to maximize resources and reach more people. This material will become a curricular thread integrated across all four years of medical school which USF MCOM calls Humanism in Action. Smith quoted Bryan Bognar, MD, MPH, vice dean of MCOM educational affairs, when she explained that the important part of this effort is to make sure that they’re “baking things in” and that the curriculum is “not an à la cart menu.” The curriculum teaches students the communication skills necessary to elicit the values of their patients and then integrate those values into the patient’s medical plan. “It’s physically impossible in four years to teach students every single nuance about all the ways a human being or population can be different,” Dr. DeWaay said. “It’s far more important to teach the attitude that they need, the skills to illicit the information from the patient and the skills to keep up on the literature, so that they have the tools that they need moving forward, to take care of any patient that’s in front of them.” According to Smith, the objective is to teach students not to assume anything about their patient, not to project their own values onto the patient and not to deviate from what is fact or what is in the evidence. Janet Roman, DNP, APRN, ACNP-BC, director of the Doctor of Nursing Practice (DNP) program in the USF Health College of Nursing (CON), added that it’s not just about what question is asked, but about how it is asked. The way a question is worded can be loaded with an assumption and be offensive to the patient. “If you ask me, “Do I have access to healthy food?” now you’re assuming that I don’t,” Dr. Roman said. “If you ask me, “Where do I get my groceries?” then that gives you the answer.”

A taskforce is also being formed to include faculty and students who will help build and implement this new Humanism in Action curriculum and be a resource to faculty for recommendations or feedback on revamping lectures, small groups and activities. One component of change cultivated by the COVID-19 pandemic is the acceptance of virtual guest speakers and virtual learning by students and educators. This will allow for a more diverse representation of speakers to be a part of the courses as well as private, small group activities that can foster more vulnerable discussions. “These beliefs have to be socially unwoven through intentional, meaningful conversations and interactions with depth and the goal is to give students that opportunity,” Smith said. “I’m just planting seeds. I may never see the tree, but I must believe that the possibility is there.”

In January 2020, MCOM earned recognition from the Alpha Omega Alpha (AOA) Honor Medical Society for their dedication to diversity and understanding in various patient populations. The medical school was one of two medical schools in Florida to receive an Award for Excellence in Inclusion, Diversity and Equity in Medical Education and Patient Care. The award recognizes medical schools, and their associated AOA chapters, that demonstrate exemplary leadership, innovation, and engagement in fostering an inclusive culture that transforms the ideas of inclusion, diversity and equity into successful programs that support student, staff and faculty diversity in service to the community.

After the murder of George Floyd in May 2020, students pleaded for a call to action for faster implementation of changes to the curriculum. “The morbidity and mortality that social determinants of health, systemic racism, and health care disparities have cost people living in this country, far surpasses the toll COVID will take, and yet we’re not tackling it with the same resources,” Dr. DeWaay said. “With COVID hitting, it shows us on a local, regional and national level, what we’re capable of doing when we’re really worried about something.” Fueled by the same passion as the students who have championed these efforts from the very beginning, Smith and Dr. DeWaay returned to the curriculum committee and presented a 15-point, call to action. The committee mandated the plan in June 2020.

Dr. Deborah DeWaay (center), associate dean of undergraduate medical education for USF Health Morsani College of Medicine, with medical students. Pre-Covid Photo.

According to the Center for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC), there is increasing evidence that Black, Indigenous and Latinx communities are suffering disproportionately from COVID-19. This is the kind of information that can spark a myth about minorities if the root of the cause is misunderstood. Black Americans are infected with COVID-19 at nearly three times the rate of white Americans and are twice as likely to die from the virus, according to a report from the National Urban League based on data from Johns Hopkins University. This is not because of any biological differences between the two groups, but instead, social determinants of health and systemic racism. This is evident in the report which shows that Blacks are more likely to have preexisting conditions that predispose them to COVID-19 infection, less likely to have health insurance, and more likely to work in jobs that do not accommodate remote work. “Your zip code may be the biggest determinate of your health outcome more than anything else,” Kevin Sneed, PharmD, dean of the USF Health Taneja College of Pharmacy (TCOP), said.

Understanding these social determinants of health is instrumental in dispelling myths and providing patient-centered care and is another key component of USF Health education. Social determinants of health are conditions in the places where people live, learn, work and play that affects a wide range of health and quality-of life-risks and outcomes. Factors can include a person’s education, financial literacy, discrimination, and access to healthy food and safe places to exercise. Students in the USF Health College of Nursing learn about disease processes such as heart failure, hypertension and diabetes, and at the same time, “we want to point out to students which populations are disproportionately affected and then give them that background on why, so that we can help close that health disparity gap,” Dr. Roman said.

According to Dr. Sneed, one of the most meaningful courses offered at the Taneja College of Pharmacy, one that has been a requirement for first-years ever since the inaugural class of 2011, is the introduction to public health course. The course was developed by the USF Health College of Public Health (COPH), continues to have input from their faculty, and mainly focuses on social determinants of health. “You spotlight that in a course and then when you give the demographics of what that means for these various communities, it really does help broaden the expanse of how people view communities of color and why we do things like Bridge Clinic and Tampa Bay Street Medicine,” Dr. Sneed said. “We’re going to have to push to a different level of comfort, maybe even discomfort for many people in order for it to really take hold.”

A pharmacist has a unique place in the community. “Not everybody has a physician or has health insurance, but anybody can go to CVS and say, “my child has a fever,” Tricia Penniecook, MD, MPH, vice dean for education and faculty affairs for COPH, said. The patient benefits if the pharmacist has a public health world view and can help make decisions that are best for the patient’s situation.

USF College of Pharmacy Dean Kevin Sneed, PharmD, and Tricia Penniecook, MD, MPH, vice dean for education, participating in a Voices in Leadership panel discussion during USF Health Multicultural Week in 2019. Pre-Covid photo.

While colleges of medicine, nursing and pharmacy focus on helping patients where they are downstream, sick that day, public health looks upstream and tries to address what has happened to bring them to that point. Instead of individual-based care, public health professionals look at the care of groups of people in the population and find and fill gaps in their access to health care or the conditions for people to be healthy. That’s why interprofessional education is a critical part of USF Health because both kinds of roles are important. “As part of the discipline of public health, you’re supposed to take care of those who are at a disadvantage,” Dr. Penniecook, said. “The structures and systems in this country have put certain populations immediately at a disadvantage just because of that’s who they are when they are born.”

An integral part of every accredited college of public health in the United States is making sure that students learn about health inequities that are based on disparities. At USF Health’s COPH, students not only have courses specifically on health inequities, but the topic is addressed in every public health course from the undergraduate to the graduate level. Having this thread at every level means that students learn what the basis of those health inequities are, what they look like and how to address them no matter where their career takes them. According to Dr. Penniecook, this means that if the student is going to be working in the community, they’ve learned about community education and teaching people about self-advocacy in the healthcare system; if the student is going to be working within the system, they’ve learned about how to measure and address health inequities; or if the student is going to have a leadership role, they’ve learned about being proactive in looking for ways to solve the health inequities such as policy development.

Prior to COVID-19, COPH started working on an academic master plan. Dr. Penniecook, described an academic master plan as a road map within the strategic initiatives of the institution, that tells you what you need to do academically to get to your goals. In response to the murder of George Floyd, Dr. Penniecook asked Donna Petersen, ScD, MHS, CPH, dean of the USF Health COPH, if they could integrate structural racism into the academic master plan. Just like MCOM’s Dr. Bognar was previously quoted as saying that these changes have to be “baked in” the curriculum, Dr. Penniecook wanted these efforts to combat structural racism to be more strategic and woven into everything they do and who they are, so that it’s more likely to stick. A variety of work groups will be formed to include faculty, staff and students to look at admissions, curriculum, teaching methods, educational spaces and recruitment, and then make recommendations to the college structure. While this master plan is a work in progress and was paused when COVID-19 first hit, Dr. Petersen has already impacted and set the tone for the two freshman courses she teaches as a part of the Master of Public Health program. She has always had a required summer reading list, but this past summer, the entire list was equipped with books on structural racism. In addition, different aspects of structural racism have been the topic of several of the College’s townhall meetings, some lead by students, as well as episodes of the Activist Lab’s Activist Lab on the Road podcast.

An interprofessional student team across the Colleges of Medicine, Nursing and Public Health, and the School of Physical Therapy, at the 2018 USF Health Research Day. Pre-Covid Photo.

The curriculum used to educate our future health care professionals is only one piece of the puzzle. The faculty who teach it are the other. “Student exposure to those from impoverished backgrounds may occur for the first time when they are in medical school,” Haywood Brown, MD, professor of obstetrics and gynecology, associate dean of diversity for USF MCOM, and vice president for institutional equity for the University of South Florida System, said. “They don’t get that in the classroom because there is so few, diverse faculty teaching the curriculum.” According to a board diversity statement from the American Council on Education (ACE), diversity in university student bodies, faculties and staff, enriches the educational experience, promotes personal growth and a health society, strengthens communities and the workplace, and enhances America’s economic competitiveness. “If you do not have a diverse workforce, the patients don’t benefit as much because you’re learning from each other,” Dr. Brown said.

In November 2020, the USF Health College of Nursing appointed Usha Menon, PhD, RN, FAAN, as the new dean after serving as interim dean of the College since February of that year. According to Dr. Roman, under this new leadership, one of the College’s initiatives is to increase the diversity, equity and inclusion not only in the curriculum, but also in the student, faculty and staff populations. As a part of this initiative, Dr. Menon realigned her senior administrators which included creating a director of diversity role, now filled by Ivonne Hernandez, PhD, RN, IBCLC, assistant professor at the USF CON. “What we are developing now, before we even start recruiting, is a way to retain,” Dr. Roman said. “We are nurse scientists, and we treat our patients and our students by the evidence. We are doing the same thing with diversity, equity and inclusion, and what our data shows is that when we have persons of color, they don’t stay.” CON’s strategic goals include increasing the diversity of research faculty by 35% and of clinical faculty by 10%, by 2023. One retention method coming soon is a mentoring program.

According to Dr. Roman, CON is not making these changes just to check off a box for diversity on a list of requirements. “The College of Nursing is doing a 360,” Dr. Roman said. “We’re changing everything. We are doing the right thing for all people and it’ll be a complete culture change.” A healthy and safe culture and work environment will also help retain high quality, diverse faculty. “We have to reiterate that incivility is not tolerated, and micro and macro aggressions are not tolerated,” Dr. Roman said. “We also have to bring to the forefront what already exists in the University processes for what to do if you feel violated and not to suffer in silence.”

Even outside of the university classrooms, USF Health students are coming together to fight racial disparities in the healthcare system. In August 2020, MCOM became an official chapter of the national White Coats 4 Black Lives. Open to all USF Health students, the goal of the organization is to safeguard the lives and well-being of patients through the elimination of racism. To accomplish this goal, WC4BL and the USF Health chapter look to foster dialogue on racism as a public health concern, end racial discrimination in medical care, and prepare future physicians to be advocates for racial justice. “It’s everyone’s responsibility, but it’s only a priority to some,” Smith said. “For those who make it their priority, we want to give them tools to learn how to engage in these spaces that make it safe for them and make it safe for the other person to have these kinds of courageous conversations. Equipping the next generation of thought leaders so they can change the thoughts out there.”

Baltimore, Maryland, USA (Feb. 23, 2021) — The Global Virus Network (GVN), a coalition comprising the world’s foremost experts in every class of virus causing disease in humans and some animals, today announced that USF Health, at the University of South Florida (USF) in Tampa, Fla., will serve as GVN’s Southeast United States Regional Headquarters.

USF Health is the first regional headquarters named by GVN to provide organizational and leadership support to GVN’s Global Headquarters in Baltimore, Md. In that capacity, USF Health will help strengthen GVN’s initial research response to emerging and re-emerging infectious diseases, such as COVID-19, and its collaborative efforts to plan for, and defend against, future epidemics and pandemics.

GVN encompasses virologists from 61 centers of excellence and 11 affiliates in 34 nations – all working to prevent illness and death from viral diseases posing threats to humanity. Bridging academia, government and industry, the coalition is internationally recognized as an authority and resource for identifying, investigating, interpreting, explaining, controlling, and suppressing viral diseases.

“USF Health is delighted to be a leading contributor to GVN’s administration, and to support and promote GVN’s virology research and public health policies. With our growing strength in infectious diseases at USF Health, the university is also well positioned to help GVN train and mentor the future leaders who can find new solutions to protect us against contagious diseases,” said Dr. Christian Bréchot, president of the GVN; associate vice president for International Partnerships and Innovation at USF; and professor, Division of Infectious Disease, Department of Internal Medicine at the USF Health Morsani College of Medicine.

The GVN Southeast U.S. Regional Headquarters based at USF Health will encompass the four health sciences colleges of the university: the USF Health Morsani College of Medicine, the College of Nursing, the College of Public Health, and the USF Health Taneja College of Pharmacy. USF Health is an integral part of USF, a high-impact global research university dedicated to student success. Over the past 10 years, no other public university in the country has risen faster in U.S. News and World Report’s national university rankings than USF.

The new Global Virus Network Southeast U.S. Regional Headquarters will be led by GVN President Dr. Christian Bréchot, professor of internal medicine at USF Health and associate vice president for International Partnerships and Innovation at USF, and GVN Vice President Linman Li of the USF Health Division of Infectious Disease and International Medicine.

“USF Health has already been supporting GVN’s administrative efforts, and we are pleased to officially recognize their past efforts and ongoing efforts to advance the GVN by naming USF Health as the GVN Southeast U.S. Regional Headquarters,” said  Dr. Robert Gallo, GVN co-founder and international scientific advisor, who is also The Homer & Martha Gudelsky Distinguished Professor in Medicine and Director of the Institute of Human Virology (IHV) at the University of Maryland School of Medicine.

In addition to their leadership roles at GVN Global Headquarters in Baltimore, Md., Dr. Bréchot and GVN Vice President Linman Li of the USF Health Division of Infectious Disease and International Medicine will lead the new GVN Southeast U.S. Regional Headquarters and focus on regional efforts to expand government and other research funding, as well as research and training initiatives. The regional headquarters designation will enable USF Health scientists to partner with GVN experts worldwide to share ideas and research, to translate research into practical applications, to improve diagnostics and therapies, and to develop vaccines.

“We look forward to partnering with the Global Virus Network to advance the coalition’s leading work in viral research and evidence-based responses to epidemics and pandemics,” said Charles J. Lockwood, MD, senior vice president for USF Health and dean of the USF Health Morsani College of Medicine. “The appearance of COVID-19 has transformed society almost beyond recognition, with lasting implications for health care, the economy and our social and psychological well-being. Together we can, and we must, be better prepared to meet the challenges of the next emerging virus.”

When new outbreaks arise, such as what happened with SARS-CoV-2, GVN experts stand ready to provide critical insights needed for infectious disease containment and prevention. The new partnership will help increase the authority, leadership, and visibility of USF Health and GVN in virology at the regional, national, and international levels.

GVN members collaborate on science-driven, independent research in many areas, including immunology and vaccines, antiviral drug therapy, virus-host interaction, diagnostic virology and epidemiology, morphogenesis and structural biology, emerging and re-emerging viruses, viruses as biotechnological tools, and trending topics in virology. They also train the next generation of virologists to combat the epidemics of the future.

About the Global Virus Network (GVN)
The Global Virus Network (GVN) is essential and critical in the preparedness, defense and first research response to emerging, existing and unidentified viruses that pose a clear and present threat to public health, working in close coordination with established national and international institutions. It is a coalition comprising eminent human and animal virologists from 61 Centers of Excellence and 11 Affiliates in 34 countries worldwide, working collaboratively to train the next generation of virologists, advance knowledge about how to identify and diagnose pandemic viruses, mitigate and control how such viruses spread and make us sick, as well as develop drugs, vaccines and treatments to combat them. No single institution in the world has expertise in all viral areas other than the GVN, which brings together the finest medical virologists to leverage their individual expertise and coalesce global teams of specialists on the scientific challenges, issues and problems posed by pandemic viruses. The GVN is a non-profit 501(c)(3) organization. For more information, please visit www.gvn.org. Follow us on Twitter @GlobalVirusNews

About USF Health
USF Health’s mission is to envision and implement the future of health. It is the partnership of the USF Health Morsani College of Medicine, the College of Nursing, the College of Public Health, the Taneja College of Pharmacy, the School of Physical Therapy and Rehabilitation Sciences, the Biomedical Sciences Graduate and Postdoctoral Programs, and USF Health’s multispecialty physicians group. The University of South Florida is a high-impact global research university dedicated to student success. Over the past 10 years, no other public university in the country has risen faster in U.S. News and World Report’s national university rankings than USF. For more information, visit health.usf.edu

To view Part I of this story, click here.

The USF Health College of Public Health (COPH) Doctor of Public Health (DrPH) program emphasizes advanced public health education and training designed to prepare individuals for leadership roles in practice-based settings. Traditionally, the program is taught through a hybrid format of primarily distance-learning courses and three, five day on-campus institutes, but COVID-19 forced these live in-person institutes to shift to virtual delivery in 2020 through Microsoft Teams. The program is designed for working professionals in the public health field, with most recent cohorts averaging five or more years of field experience, to gain the opportunity to connect and collaborate with other doctoral students in both the DrPH and PhD programs and strengthen their skills for public health leadership, practice and research without interrupting their careers. These doctoral students come from a wide range of fields including epidemiology, county and state level disaster and emergency preparedness and response, health education, health law, laboratory operations management, maternal and child health, social work, food insecurity, and others. They work across federal and state government agencies along with local county health departments, healthcare organizations, non-profits, universities, consulting practices, to name a few.

COVID-19 clearly had other plans in mind for the program and for the careers of current USF Health DrPH students who immediately became key parts of COVID-19 operations across the country and abroad. These students stepped up, represented public health in their organization’s interprofessional teams and really demonstrated the College of Public Health’s motto, “our practice is our passion.” The following biographical sketches provide summaries of the backgrounds and a focus on the roles these DrPH students are contributing in their communities in the fight against COVID-19.

Shara Wesley, DrPH, MPH

Executive Director of the Center for Health Equity (WCHE) and Community Health Department, WellStar Healthcare System

ATLANTA, GA – Dr.Wesley leads new and expansions of current initiatives that address social determinants of health and health equity with the goal of reducing systemic disparities and their impact on communities for WellStar, one of the largest integrated healthcare systems in Georgia. Supported by an interdisciplinary team, Dr. Wesley helped to launch COVID pop-up testing sites, a mobile food market, a Community Transformation Program and a Health Equity Series. “COVID has reinforced the power of enhancing collaboration and effective partnerships among all sectors and stakeholders,” Dr. Wesley said. “Our country is highly interconnected; we are all part of an interdependent system, where the sharing of ideas, information, knowledge, and movement people and of goods, are truly boundless. This interconnectedness is also the basis for our health system, and as any system, the strength of all parts is crucial.”

The initial efforts in the summer were focused on increasing COVID testing accessibility in communities of color by deploying small teams to neighborhood-based pop-up sites to offer drive up and walk up COVID testing. Safety kits were also available at these sites and included a mask, hand sanitizer, and information from the CDC. “Oftentimes, these sites were faith-based organizations that are a part of WellStar’s Congregational Health Network,” Dr. Wesley said. “We found that offering these smaller events allowed us to be flexible so we could be deployed to any hotspots and ensure we were offering culturally/linguistically appropriate education.”

Dr. Shara Wesley, third from left, with her Wellstar team and Georgia Congressman David Scott (center), during a COVID-19 pop-up testing and food distribution event. (Photo courtesy of Wesley)

COVID testing is not the only pop-ups Dr. Wesley’s team has brought to Atlanta. Through their 2019 Community Health Needs Assessment (CHNA), Dr. Wesley’s team knows that many of their community members are struggling with consistent food access or food insecurity and that has only been exacerbated by COVID. “By partnering with Goodr, we will begin hosting seven monthly markets that offer a free grocery shopping experience for 700 families,” Dr. Wesley said.

In addition, they successfully launched their Community Transformation Program which is piloting five initiatives that leverage the use of technology to increase access to healthcare and/or social support. “The COVID-19 pandemic unmasked dramatic disparities, with African Americans and Latinx community members accounting for a disproportionate share of COVID-19 infections, hospitalizations, and deaths,” Dr. Wesley said. “Crises often amplify existing inequities and highlight the urgent need to address the root causes of health inequities.” WellStar Health System’s Center for Health Equity and the Georgia Health Policy Center hosted a six part webinar series focused on achieving equity in Georgia, in partnership with the Atlanta Regional Collaboration for Health Improvement and the Partnership for Southern Equity. “This series will engage community, clinical, and other partners in building a community-level understanding of health equity by exploring the root causes of common and persistent inequities and providing evidence-informed, practical tips and tools to address these inequities in Georgia,” Dr. Wesley said.

Now in 2021, the team will shift focus to add COVID vaccination education and, when available, administration. Dr. Wesley hopes to create an openness to receiving the vaccine but is faced with the challenge of the general public’s confusion about the virus and wanting to “wait and see” before receiving the vaccination, combined with Black Americans’ longtime mistrust of the medical community. “We know it is important for the community to see and hear public health leaders share their reasons for receiving the COVID vaccination,” Dr. Wesley said. “It is equally important that we also empathetically listen to their reservations and in response offer science-informed information.”

Dr. Wesley’s educational background includes a Bachelor of Science in Biology with a minor in Chemistry in addition to a Master’s in Public Health. In 2017, she enrolled in USF Health’s DrPH program with a concentration in Advanced Practice Leadership, “because I wanted to reinforce what I learned in the field with contemporary applications of public health research,” Dr. Wesley said. Fortunately for Dr. Wesley, she completed most of the program prior to COVID and was able to participate in the in-person summer institutes which she recalls as her favorite part of the program. “While they were often intense and loaded with information, it was a great time to reconnect with the USF Health COPH community, faculty and staff,” Dr. Wesley said. “The endless conversations helped demystify coursework or program requirements because you could troubleshoot in real time with other students.” A small group of the 2017 DrPH Cohort have remained connected via WhatsApp, providing each other with encouragement to stay focused on the heightened demand in their careers and the DrPH graduation requirements.

Wesley closed out 2020 in celebratory fashion when she was deemed one of “Georgia’s best and brightest” with the prestigious 40 Under 40 award from Georgia Trend, followed by successfully defending her DrPH dissertation: Black Women Podcast Listenership and its Impact on Psychological Openness, Help-Seeking Propensity and Indifference to Stigma.

Meaghan K. Crowley, MPH

Director of Community Health for the Florida Department of Health (DOH)

MARION COUNTY, FL – Crowley has always wanted to work in public health ever since she was 7 years old and saw the movie, And The Band Played On. “I used to tell everybody, ‘I want to be an epidemiologist and virologist for the CDC and work on level 4 contagions,’” Crowley said. She used to work in global health and then she ended up moving to Florida and working for the Florida Department of Health (DOH) and falling in love with community health.

For the DOH, forming an Incident Management Team (IMT) is common practice for emergency response situations such as hurricanes or a Hepatitis A outbreak. IMTs follow the Federal Emergency Management Agency’s (FEMA) Incident Command System (ICS) Structure and contain the core leadership group that is going to be in charge of planning the response and then putting it into action. At the top of the chain of command is the Incident Commander followed by the Operations Chief, Logistics Chief, Medical Officer, Community Liaison, Public Information Officer (PIO) and finally, any additional roles as needed to respond to the emergency situation. The COVID IMT was formed in December 2019 when the news of COVID-19 first broke so when Florida reported its first case on March 20th, 2020, the IMT was already built out and it was time to put their plans into action. Within the structure of the COVID IMT, Crowley is the Community Liaison. Even though IMTs exist year-round, “they’re usually for acute issues like hurricanes,” Crowley said. “Even for the year and a half outbreak of Hepatitis A, the IMT only needed to meet once a week. The COVID IMT meets twice a day, every day and has been for the past year.”

The IMT is the lead agency in charge of all of the county’s planning and response efforts, but the Department of Health cannot put policies in place, they can only provide recommendations. Working with Emergency Management, recommendations such as wearing masks are given to the county commissioners, city council, the mayor, the sheriff and the police chief, and to the school board for policies and protocols.

Meaghan Crowley, working at the Marion County Emergency Operations Center during Hurricane Dorian in 2019. (Pre-COVID photo courtesy of Crowley)

 In addition to being the community liaison on the COVID IMT, Crowley is also in charge of monitoring and response for all long term care facilities in Marion County, such as assisted living facilities, nursing homes and rehabilitation centers. In the beginning, to prepare the facilities, Crowley made sure that the staff understood infection control procedures, what signs and symptoms to be aware of, how often they should be testing the staff and residents, and that they had the correct personal protective equipment (PPE). The staff also needed to understand what to do in case they got a COVID-19 case and how the plan changes if it’s a positive staff member versus a positive resident. She started doing daily phone calls to all of the facilities to help monitor and in case they had any questions. Then Crowley went in person to every facility to help them with their preparedness plans. Once the facilities started getting positives, she went to the facilities to do an investigation on the case and try to find out the infection source and to implement mitigation and response strategies to keep the outbreak as contained as possible. “It spreads like wildfire in these facilities and they are our most fragile individuals,” Crowley said. “The majority of Marion County deaths have been in these facilities.”

Like for most organizations, COVID-19 has shut down the majority of the normal day-to-day operations for the DOH and efforts that use to be directed towards community outreach clinics and programs have now been redirected to COVID. “The dental clinic was shut down for 6 months, so a tiny cavity or a little bit of decay, which could have been prevented or mitigated earlier on, suddenly turns into an abscess or a major infection,” Crowley said. “It also created an additional burden on the hospital system because when people couldn’t get care, they went to the Emergency Room. On top of that, overdoses tripled within the first three months of COVID.”

According to Crowley, the silver lining of the pandemic is the improvement of interprofessionalism among her coworkers. “COVID has forced us to all work together as a team, because we are in the middle of an emergency that we have never seen in our lifetime,” Crowley said. “Everyone is learning each other’s roles and it has actually brought a lot more appreciation and understanding to what the different departments do. A lot of the staff has said that it has really been a great bonding experience, incredibly stressful, but an incredible bonding experience.”

Crowley’s educational background includes a Bachelor of Science in Food Science and Human Nutrition from the University of Florida and a Master’s in Public Health from New York University. Crowley was also a part of the inaugural class of the newly revived USF Health Public Health Executive Leadership Program, designed for rising stars in the Florida Department of Health. It was through this program at USF, that Crowley met Anthony Masys, PhD and Marissa Levine, MD, MPH, faculty organizers of the program, who were very encouraging of the DrPH program. “They were absolutely incredible and inspiring,” said Crowley. “I loved having a different perspective and I loved the richness of what they were able to give.” Crowley realized that she missed academia and missed learning, especially from an academic medical center that is on the cutting-edge of technology and research. Even though she is a die-hard Gator, Crowley decided to take that next step in her career with USF because their DrPH program is top ranked in the country and she loved the kindness and support that she got from faculty even when she was just considering applying to the program.

Dr. Marissa Levine, far left, and Dr. Anthony Masys, far right, flank some of the Public Health Executive Leadership Program 2019 graduates in the atrium of the COPH. (Pre-COVID photo by Caitlin Keough)

According to Crowley, in a Master of Public Health, you get the basics, but the DrPh makes you think about public health at a higher level and from a very different, more holistic perspective. Even just one semester into the program, Crowley has found the DrPH program to be incredibly helpful in her career. Being in the program helped her IMT’s plans improve and at the same time, her work experience gives her resources to conduct the research she needs to get through the program. “Since we are able to choose our own topics for our assignments, I’ve been able to choose topics that I’m actually working on at work such as making sure that the COVID responses are implemented from a health equity perspective and our vaccine roll out plan,” Crowley said.

Crowley feels that she is incredibly lucky to be at the forefront of public health and to be a part of the COVID-19 response and a part of history.

Jennifer Loeffler-Cobia, M.S.

Senior Researcher and Deputy Director of the National Reentry Resource Center (NRRC), American Institutes for Research

WASHINGTON, D.C. – Treatment for vulnerable populations cannot stop even during a health crisis. As part of her role as the Deputy Director of the National Reentry Resource Center (NRRC), funded through the Bureau of Justice Assistance, Loeffler-Cobia provides technical assistance to department of corrections (DOC) across the country. “Specifically pertaining to the pandemic, I work with DOCs to identify challenges the system is currently facing when trying to balance evidence-based practices implementation, community safety, and the health of staff and those being served; innovations that the system is trying to implement to help overcome their challenges; and identify lessons learned to help their systems improve policies, procedures, and program to better prepare for future implementation readiness during a crisis of this magnitude,” said Loeffler-Cobia.

Implementation readiness has always been a part of the way Loeffler-Cobia works with systems trying to implement policies and interventions, but COVID-19 brought to the forefront the importance of that framework and highlighted some areas that needed improvement. “We want this population to be able to have the education and the resources not only to be able to succeed when they return to their communities and families, but also understand how to prevent the spread of COVID-19 and have access to the necessary health, employment, treatment, and housing resources,” said Loeffler-Cobia.

Her educational background includes a Bachelor of Science in Public Health and a Master of Science in Health, both from Utah State University. Loeffler-Cobia wanted to focus on advancing her leadership skills to help impact system change and so in August 2020, she enrolled in USF Health’s DrPH program to help bring her personal and professional plans to fruition and further her professional career. “I have always had a passion for public health, substance mis-use prevention and treatment, and overall just helping to provide a better quality of life for vulnerable populations,” said Loeffler-Cobia. She was accepted into all of the programs she applied to, but she chose USF because she felt the staff and curriculum were the best match with her professional interests. “The USF doctoral in public health curriculum will equip me with the requisite tools for developing, implementing, and evaluating evidence-informed public health approaches that are relevant in preventing and reducing substance mis-use and school and community violence, and incorporating these approaches to assist with juvenile and criminal justice system change,” said Loeffler-Cobia.

Rachel Guran, MPH, BSN, RN, CIC

Director of Epidemiology and Infection Prevention, Memorial Healthcare System

HOLLYWOOD, FL – Prior to COVID-19, the name Rachel Guran might have been unknown to some of the staff at Memorial Healthcare System. Now, “every department knows who I am and how important infection control is in a healthcare system,” said Guran. Not only is Guran a role model for public health safety inside Memorial Healthcare System, but she also represents Memorial out in the community, often quoted as the subject expert on COVID and influenza prevention in local blogs, newspapers, and social media posts. “As the system director for all infection prevention activities, I have been involved in creating all hospital policies and procedures related to COVID including anything having to do with personal protective equipment and infection prevention and control steps to prevent the spread of COVID amongst the healthcare workers and patients,” said Guran. Hospitals are run with multidisciplanary teams on an everyday basis and it’s especially important when it comes to infection control. “Every team member in a hospital has a responsibility for ownership of infection control – hand washing and preventing cross contamination,” said Guran.

Rachel Guran (back left) was part of a live press briefing about the coronavirus crisis in Florida with Governor Ron DeSantis on West Palm Beach News, an NBC-affiliated television station. (Photo courtesy of Guran)

In August 2020, Guran enrolled in USF Health’s DrPH program with a concentration in Advanced Practice Leadership. “Hospital epidemiology and infection prevention is a growing part of the public health world. I would like to give back to our profession through translating our bedside experience into research and public policy,” said Guran. Her educational background includes a Bachelor of Science in Psychology, a Master of Public Health in Health Promotion and Disease Prevention, and a Bachelor of Science in Nursing. Guran decided to pursue a Doctorate because it’s, “a rigorous coursework that signifies true leadership and expertise in a chosen field of study,” said Guran. She chose USF Health’s program because of the national recognition in Public Health training with professors that are leaders in the field.

Even though Guran just recently started the program, she has already been able to apply some of the lessons to the real-world setting and says that working towards a Doctor of Public Health during a pandemic is a unique experience because it can be examine from a scholarly standpoint as it’s happening. She also appreciates the connections to her classmates that have allowed her to work on real-world activities with the Florida Department of Health and the Centers for Disease Control (CDC).

Being the Director of Epidemiology and Infection Prevention for Memorial Healthcare System is Guran’s dream job and she couldn’t think of a better career.

In this video, USF Health epidemiologist Jason Salemi, PhD, explains how he creates and uses online dashboards to show the effects of COVID-19 in Florida.

Using data from the Florida Department of Health, Dr. Salemi creates online charts and tables to give the public updated, easy-to-understand information about the pandemic.

The dashboard, available at covid19florida.mystrikingly.com, is interactive and lets visitors break down data on COVID-19 case numbers and deaths into dozens of visualizations. For instance, visitors can view newly reported cases by county or age group as well as see changes over several days or weeks.

The dashboard has attracted nationwide attention. Dr. Salemi says he was inspired to create the dashboard as a way to provide reliable information and combat misinformation he said he saw regularly spread about the disease on the internet and elsewhere.

USF Health epidemiologist Dr. Jason Salemi pictured in his office near the computer he uses to gather and distribute data on COVID-19.

The USF Health College of Public Health (COPH) Doctor of Public Health (DrPH) program emphasizes advanced public health education and training designed to prepare individuals for leadership roles in practice-based settings. Traditionally, the program is taught through a hybrid format of primarily distance-learning courses and three, five day on-campus institutes, but COVID-19 forced these live in-person institutes to shift to virtual delivery in 2020 through Microsoft Teams. The program is designed for working professionals in the public health field, with most recent cohorts averaging five or more years of field experience, to gain the opportunity to connect and collaborate with other doctoral students in both the DrPH and PhD programs and strengthen their skills for public health leadership, practice and research without interrupting their careers. These doctoral students come from a wide range of fields including epidemiology, county and state level disaster and emergency preparedness and response, health education, health law, laboratory operations management, maternal and child health, social work, food insecurity, and others. They work across federal and state government agencies along with local county health departments, healthcare organizations, non-profits, universities, consulting practices, to name a few.

COVID-19 clearly had other plans in mind for the program and for the careers of current USF Health DrPH students who immediately became key parts of COVID-19 operations across the country and abroad. These students stepped up, represented public health in their organization’s interprofessional teams and really demonstrated the College of Public Health’s motto, “our practice is our passion.” The following biographical sketches provide summaries of the backgrounds and a focus on the roles these DrPH students are contributing in their communities in the fight against COVID-19.

 Stephanie Anspaugh-Naples, MPH

State Medical Countermeasure (MCM) Coordinator, Florida Department of Health (DOH)

PINELLAS COUNTY, FL – Anspaugh-Naples’ job on a daily basis is to help plan for the mass dispensing and mass vaccination of the State of Florida. The importance of her role heightened when COVID-19 broke out and once the vaccines became available, “all the work we’ve done to build partnerships, upgrade systems and learn from previous responses will be put to the test,” Anspaugh-Naples said. “It’s exciting and terrifying.”

In addition to being the chairperson for the Association of State and Territorial Health Officials (ASTHO) MCM Coordinators Workgroup, she is currently part of the state’s COVID-19 Response Team for Emergency Support Function 8 – Public Health and Medical (ESF-8) and leads the COVID-19 Mass Vaccination Planning Workgroup. “We are developing strategies to ensure that everyone in the state will have access to a COVID-19 vaccine as doses become available,” Anspaugh-Naples said. “Florida is a very diverse state, so we are engaging other agencies and organizations to work through existing channels to expand our ability to reach everyone in the state.”

Anspaugh-Naples is based out of Pinellas County, Florida, but the rest of her Bureau working on this effort together is in Tallahassee. Her work in public health response is always a collaborative effort and when it’s all-hands-on-deck for an outbreak like COVID-19, the teamwork not only includes internal partners at DOH but also other state agencies, community partners, the Florida Division of Emergency Management, Florida Hospital Association, American Medical Response, International Medical Corps, county emergency management agencies and many others. “Relationships are a critical part of preparedness and response work,” Anspaugh-Naples said.

Stephanie Anspaugh-Naples at the State Emergency Operations Center in Tallahassee, Florida. (Pre-COVID photo courtesy of Anspaugh-Naples)

Originally a USF Bull, Anspaugh-Naples’ educational background includes a Bachelor of Science in Biology from USF and a Master of Public Health in Epidemiology from Emory University. In 2016, she returned to her alma mater for the DrPH program because it was the only program that was flexible enough for a working professional and had the ability to tailor the education based on her interests. “When I looked at other public health doctoral programs, there wasn’t another DrPH program that paralleled USF’s,” Anspaugh-Naples said. “I only applied to USF and my plan was to continue applying until I got in. Thankfully, I was accepted on my first try but I was ready to be persistent for however long it took.”

Her studies in the program have focused on public health preparedness and response and systems thinking/theories. Since Anspaugh-Naples started the program prior to COVID, she was able to participate in an in-person fall institute. In her first class, Joe Bohn, PhD, MBA, assistant professor and deputy director of the USF Health DrPH Program, covered systems thinking and similar theories which really resonated with her. Dr. Bohn soon became her faculty advisor and has helped her shape her doctoral project. Through discussions with Dr. Bohn and Marissa Levine, MD, MPH, FAAFP, professor and director of the USF Health Center for Leadership in Public Health Practice (CLPHP), about her doctoral project, she learned about Cynefin, a conceptual framework used to aid decision-making. “When the COVID-19 Mass Vaccination Planning Workgroup first started, I shared a graphic of the Cynefin framework with the team,” Anspaugh-Naples said. “Planning a mass vaccination campaign with so many unknowns has been a challenge but employing concepts from Cynefin helped me to focus on what we do know, rather than on what we didn’t/don’t know.”

COVID-19 has reinforced her passion for public health preparedness and response. “There’s a certain ebb and flow to the work that ensures I’m never bored or unchallenged and I appreciate that. Plus, I feel like the work I’m doing helps people, even if they never know I’m doing it,” Anspaugh-Naples said.

Planning a state mass vaccination campaign has slowed down the progress Anspaugh-Naples wanted to make on her doctoral plan, but she’s grateful to have friends in her cohort who are in a similar position and remind her that, “every step, no matter how small, is still a step forward.” Anspaugh-Naples stresses the importance of maintaining professional working relationships and she feels that the best part of the DrPH program has been her ability to build those lasting relationships with her classmates and professors.

Jarad Schiffer, MS

Supervisory Health Scientist and Advisor for Laboratory Preparedness, Centers for Disease Control and Prevention

ATLANTA, GA – At the beginning of the outbreak, Schiffer was running an immunology laboratory at the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC). In March, his team was asked to stand up serology testing for COVID surveillance. “We took a research assay to measure anti-Spike IgG and modified it to increase the throughput from 10 specimens/run to 88 specimens/run, validated it using ~100 PCR-confirmed COVID samples and ~300 negative samples we had left from pre-COVID studies,” said Schiffer. “From April to October we tested a little over 112,000 specimens. Our data was the basis for Dr. Redfield’s interview where he indicated that there were ~10 unconfirmed cases for each confirmed case.”

Schiffer’s laboratory was originally set up for the Anthrax Vaccine Research Program and then they went on to work on the Pertussis vaccine as well as provide laboratory support for the 2009 H1N1 outbreak, the 2014 Ebola outbreak and STRIVE vaccine trial, and the 2016 Zika outbreak. Once COVID-19 began, like most organizations, all but the most critical non-COVID work was put on hold. “Our work practices changed to maximize telework and social distancing for laboratory work, working in shared spaces felt more like working in the BSL-3 laboratory,” said Schiffer.

Schiffer changed jobs in October, where most of his current work is not COVID-related, but instead, looking at ways to improve laboratory preparedness for emergency responses across CDC, and in state and local public health laboratories. The one exception is the new collaboration with Operation Warp Speed on a non-human primate trial to try to establish a correlate of protection for COVID vaccines.

In August 2020, Schiffer enrolled in USF Health’s DrPH program. He originally was concentrating in Clinical Laboratory Science and Practice but has since switched to Advanced Practice Leadership to better suit his change in jobs. His educational background includes a Bachelor of Arts in Molecular Biology and a Master of Science in Biology. “While my Biology background and experience is strong, I do a lot of collaborations with epidemiologists,” said Schiffer. “I have learned on the job what I needed for each project with them, but always felt that I had gaps in my knowledge of epidemiology in general.” Schiffer had been looking for several years for some type of doctoral program, but most required either on-site or full-time learning, and he did not want to leave his current job. “The USF program is the first one I found that was both highly rated and feasible to do while working full time,” said Schiffer. The DrPH program is his first experience with extensive online remote learning, but thanks to COVID, his youngest is also using Canvas for virtual high school, so they’re learning to navigate online school together.

The courses in the DrPH program are already making a difference in Schiffer’s career, as he was able to make useful contributions towards the CDC’s new framework for Public Health Preparedness and Response research, with emphasis on a systems approach and improving health equity, without having to first play catch-up on those issues. Schiffer also excitedly recalls that the gap in his research toolbox is already shrinking because, “in a recent meeting with our extramural research director she started talking about the social determinants of health, and thanks to my first semester courses I actually knew what she was talking about.”

Jennifer Gunderman, MPH

Director of the Maine Area Health Education Center (AHEC), University of New England

PORTLAND, ME – As a leader in workforce development with specific focus on rural and underserved communities, the work of the Maine AHEC Network highlights the strengths, challenges, and opportunities faced by populations vulnerable to health disparities. “COVID-19 has not changed my role, just the urgency in which things need to get accomplished,” said Gunderman.

The Maine AHEC Network has used CARES Act funds for health profession education programs to promote the use of telehealth technologies and continue its mission to provide workforce development opportunities while enhancing the prevention, preparation, and response to COVID-19. Preparation activities have included Project ECHO programming, trainings at health profession schools, and continuing education on self-care and resiliency. UNE has recently become a Project ECHO hub and AHEC staff have completed training to implement ECHO sessions.  The Program Office is working with students in health profession programs to offer COVID-19 related training on PPE, screening, testing, treatment, and control measures. “None of the work of Maine AHEC could be done on our own,” said Gunderman. “We rely on networks of health care, public health, community-based organizations, private partnerships, governmental agencies, etc. Our work revolves around interprofessional and multisector collaborations. It takes a system to create sustainable change.”

The Program Office and Regional Centers is collaborating with health systems, Maine Chapters of healthcare affiliations, and others to offer continuing education opportunities to healthcare professionals related to self-care, resiliency, and mental health first aid. The Program Office is also partnering with Gateway Community Services, a community-based program serving refugees and immigrants, to assess the impact of COVID 19 on the community of immigrants and refugees and to identify ways to improve health outcomes.

In September 2020, Gunderman enrolled in USF Health’s DrPH program with a concentration in Advanced Practice Leadership. “I wanted to become the student,” said Gunderman. “I feel like I have reached a point in my personal and professional life that my skills could be enhanced and strengthened to have greater impact on public health.”

Her educational background includes a Bachelor of Science in Health Policy and Management from Providence College in Rhode Island, and a Master’s in Public Health with a certificate in Maternal and Child Health Epidemiology from Emory University in Georgia. Gunderman chose the University of South Florida for her DrPH because of the focus in leadership development and public health practice within the context of application in the real world. “I appreciate the general care the faculty and staff have for the students and creating an authentic learning environment,” said Gunderman. “While I am still in my first semester, the course work has been immediately applicable to my work. The models and concepts taught by Dr. Levine has been immediately applied to enhancing my leadership style as I guide my team of staff through these unprecedented times. What I have learned about social marketing in Dr. Pasha’s class has allowed me to use this framework when talking about addressing the infodemic related to COVID-19. I even included it in a panel in which I participated.”

The work of public health professionals is often happening behind the scenes, but COVID-19 pushed it to the forefront and turned on a spotlight for the general public to have a better understanding of what public health does and its important role in our world. “Public health is in everything,” said Gunderman. “With public health’s foundation in equity and justice and basis in science, the core principles and values should be applied to just about anything we do in this world.”

Sarah Scharf, MPH

Founding Member and Chief Administrative Officer of MD1 Program

NEW BRUNSWICK, NJ – While working full time at Rutgers University as Program Manager of Population Sciences in Administration and Planning at Rutgers Cancer Institute, Scharf helped found as a 501c3, the MD1 Program. MD1 specializes in bringing 24/7, immediate life-saving care to the scene of an incident when patients are unable to get to the hospital such as in the case of entrapment or a mass casualty incident. In regards to COVID-19, MD1 has also trained more than 120 first responders on the proper use of personal protective equipment (PPE), helped facilitate logistics for various testing and vaccination programs in New Jersey and across the United States and intubated patients while wearing powered air purifying respirators (PAPRs) in order to reduce risk of viral transmission to paramedics. “COVID has pivoted our life saving model. With fewer cars on the road, fewer citizens out and about and fewer flights in the skies, COVID has become a main focus of our life saving endeavors, especially during the peak of the pandemic in the NJ/NY area,” said Scharf.

An MD1 doctor demonstrating intubation while wearing a Powered Air Purifying Respirator (PAPR). (Photo courtesy of Scharf)

In August 2020, Scharf enrolled in USF Health’s DrPH program with a concentration in Advanced Practice Leadership. Her educational background includes a Master’s in Public Health from Rutgers University. “The field of public health is rapidly expanding due to several factors and will continue even more so to need passionate, dedicated and trained individuals,” said Scharf. “I decided to pursue a DrPH to gain new perspectives, insights, and techniques to build upon my current skill set. I hope to develop advanced problem-solving skills and help strengthen my credibility as well as increase opportunities.” She chose to continue her education at USF because the program is ranked among the top 5 online DrPH programs. So far, Scharf has been enjoying the intellectually rich environment, passion and expertise of the faculty and diverse group of cohorts, and she looks forward to the day when it’s safe to meet some of her classmates in person.

“Ultimately my aim as a public health professional is to promote and protect the health of people and the communities where they live, learn, work, and play,” said Scharf. “I wholeheartedly believe this Doctorate of Public Health in Advanced Practice Leadership will help me become a better leader and make a greater impact towards the overall betterment of society. I am truly honored to have been accepted into this program and look forward to this enriching journey.”

An MD1 EMS Physician on the scene of a car accident. (Photo courtesy of Scharf)

Alida Gertz, MD, MPH, MSc

Core Faculty in the Family Medicine Residency Program, WellStar Healthcare System

ATLANTA, GA – Dr. Gertz is a Board-Certified Family Physician and helps to take care of patients in outpatient clinics and hospitals in the WellStar Healthcare System. Since COVID-19, her calendar became a bit more packed with multiple weekly team meetings about implementing new safety protocols for the family medicine outpatient clinic, reviewing current literature for clinical care of patients in the hospital with COVID-19 and discussing, approving and guiding COVID-19 research conducted within WellStar hospital and clinic. “The decisions we make have a direct impact on the care given to our patients,” Dr. Gertz said. “One of the biggest challenges is people are really scared of COVID-19, including our staff.” One decision that was presented at the outpatient clinic faculty meeting was whether COVID-19 testing should be offered at the clinic. While offering rapid testing breaks now barriers to access for patients, it also encourages potentially COVID-positive patients to come to the clinic, putting the staff, residents and students at risk. Once the clinic’s team determined that they had the proper protocols in place, such as enough personal protective equipment (PPE), they ultimately made the decision to offer COVID-19 testing.

Another challenge was the clinic normally offered home visits which was a critical way to reach the more vulnerable populations such as the working-class African Americans and Hispanic, Latinx and Vietnamese immigrants living just South of Atlanta. Like for many healthcare systems, COVID-19 pushed WellStar’s telehealth platform to be rolled out across the entire healthcare system instead of its previously limited availability. Unfortunately, telehealth often leaves out the more vulnerable populations and so the clinic staff are, “trying really hard to continue to offer them services, but in a safe way for the staff,” Dr. Gertz said.

Dr. Gertz’s educational background includes a Medical Degree and Master of Public Health from Case Western Reserve University and a Master of Science in Epidemiology and a Professional Diploma in Tropical Medicine and Hygiene from the London School of Hygiene and Tropical Medicine. She completed two years of Internal Medicine residency at Johns Hopkins University, and two years of Family Medicine residency at the University of Pennsylvania and a Global Health Fellowship at the University of Washington and another through Harvard TH Chan School of Public Health. Dr. Gertz decided to pursue a DrPH with a concentration in Advanced Practice Leadership, because she was interested in transitioning to a career in public health and while she already has an MPH, she wanted a more solid, formal training in public health as well as additional experience and training in statistics and particularly using SAS

While completing her first semester of the DrPH program, Dr. Gertz is developing an anti-racism curriculum for her resident students at WellStar. “I received input from my professors on the best way to develop the program so that it is grounded in research and the curriculum can be evaluated in a meaningful way,” Dr. Gertz said. “It wouldn’t have been as well designed without the supervision and guidance from my professors because it wouldn’t have been done in such a systematic and structured way.” The assignments in the program are often directly or indirectly influenced by the pandemic and Dr. Gertz notes that she feels a unique sense of urgency to complete her work because the research can influence the current state of affairs. For example, in her Social Marketing course, she is on a team that is focusing on decreasing COVID-19 vaccine hesitancy among African Americans.

Already following through with her desire to transition to a career in public health, Dr. Gertz recently accepted a position with the CDC in the Division of Global Migration and Quarantine. According to the CDC, their mission is to, “reduce morbidity and mortality among immigrants, refugees, travelers, expatriates, and other globally mobile populations, and to prevent the introduction, transmission, and spread of communicable diseases through regulation, science, research, preparedness, and response.” COVID-19 created the need for a team member specifically dedicated to COVID-19 protocols and that will soon be Dr. Gertz’s role. The job is based out of the Hartsfield-Jackson Atlanta International Airport and focuses on traveler health for various major airports in the U.S. as well as for a number of seaports.

While each student shares a desire to gain more knowledge and expertise in the public health field, each student has their own specific interests and different needs. Even just one semester into the program, Dr. Gertz appreciates the individualized attention she has received from the supportive and responsive faculty. “The faculty are kind and caring and very knowledgeable about their areas of expertise. They each bring their own perspective and a lot of experience,” Dr. Gertz said.

For more, continue to Part II of this story.

The USF Health Tampa Bay Street Medicine, Hillsborough County and Pioneer Foundation Needle Exchange Program is ready to hit the road as Florida’s second needle exchange or syringe service program (SSP). In conjunction with Tampa General Hospital, the Health, Equality and Linkage Project (HELP) Medical Van will offer to persons who inject drugs (PWID), a safe place to turn in used syringes for clean ones to avoid sharing blood-borne diseases like HIV and Hepatitis C, get anonymously tested for those diseases and be linked to free primary care, wound care, or drug treatment programs among other social services. Targeted locations in Hillsborough County will be those with the highest rates of HIV and opioid overdoses such as around the University Square Mall and downtown Tampa.

Representatives for the USF Health Tampa Bay Street Medicine, Hillsborough County and Pioneer Foundation Needle Exchange Program during a mock run through outside the University Square Mall.

Formed in 2014, Tampa Bay Street Medicine (TBSM) is a USF Health Morsani College of Medicine (MCOM) student-run service organization supervised by faculty that provides medical care to underserved populations. It was initially started to meet the needs of Tampa’s homeless community but continues to evolve as student leaders recognize opportunities to help elsewhere. TBSM students conduct biweekly street runs in unsheltered settings near the I-275 bypass, operate continuity clinics at First Presbyterian Church, and staff a medical van at a variety of clinic sites in partnership with Pioneer Medical Foundation.

USF Health Tampa Bay Street Medicine students talk with a homeless man during a night of biweekly street runs in unsheltered settings near the I-275 bypass. Pre-COVID photo.

“We’re going to the same locations where we’ve built that relationship, where they know that we have providers for primary care and they can trust us already,” said Asa Oxner, MD, FACP, faculty advisor for the USF Health TBSM and vice chair of the USF Health MCOM Department of Internal Medicine. “We have around 800 reoccurring customers in these locations, so we can first start by serving the people we already know well and work on marketing and growth.”

At a PWID’s first visit to the program, they can receive up to 10 clean hypodermic needles and every visit after that, it’s a 1:1 exchange. SSP volunteers will also distribute condoms, alcohol swabs, portable sharps containers and Naloxone (or Narcan), an emergency treatment for narcotic overdose. Pioneer also staffs the Lily Pharmacy free medical clinic inside the University Square Mall, adding another layer of resources along with the other community agencies partnering to offer downstream care for clients who engage in the SSP’s services. Enrollees in the program are tracked with a nickname and an ID number associated with a laminated card they’re asked to carry that identifies them as part of the SSP. If the card holder is arrested for drug paraphernalia, USF providers are working with the local police authorities to have our clients placed in drug rehabilitation instead of jail. At the same time, when PWID carry clean needles and a portable sharps container, it protects the law enforcement and first responders in return.

From inside of the medical van, Jerren Creak, MPH, patient care services research associate for Tampa General Hospital, explains the disease testing options to a mock patient, a member of the community in remission from a substance use disorder, during a mock run through of the needle exchange program.

“In communities where drug users are invited to swap out used needles without retribution, hospitals have reported major declines in the spread of blood-borne infections like hepatitis C and HIV, increased enrollment in drug treatment programs and fewer opioid-related overdose deaths,” said Khary Rigg, PhD, associate professor at the University of South Florida’s Department of Mental Health Law & Policy, in a report from the Tampa Bay Times. “As for the cost, research has shown that every $1 spent on needle exchange programs yields an average $7 savings in avoided costs for HIV-related medical treatment.”

According to the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, more than 140 Americans die from drug overdoses every day. The U.S. Opioid Epidemic was declared a public health emergency by the United States Department of Health and Human Services (HHS) in 2017. SSPs are a key part of harm reduction strategy, meeting people who use drugs “where they’re at,” and addressing conditions of use along with the use itself. SSPs have been legal in many other states for decades, but it was not legal in Florida until recently. Thanks to the relentless fight for legislative approval and the resulting success of the University of Miami’s IDEA Exchange, a pilot program that was approved in a 2016 exception policy, Governor Ron DeSantis signed into law the Infectious Disease Elimination Act (IDEA) on June 27, 2019.  IDEA allows county commissions to authorize sterile needle and syringe exchange programs for PWID. The law states that disease prevention must be the goal of every exchange program, they cannot use state, county or municipal funds to operate, and they are required to be funded through grants and donations from private resources and funds.

A grant already pays for prescription medications for patients of existing programs operating through partnerships with the University of South Florida, Tampa General Hospital, the Drug Abuse Comprehensive Coordinating Office and Gracepoint, and the SPP will be allowed to use that money to buy the county’s first batch of hypodermic needles and syringes.

With this green light, TBSM and USF faculty began advocating for an SSP in Hillsborough County with the Hillsborough County Commissioner’s Office Opioid Task Force Behavioral Health subcommittee. They used the robust data from Miami’s IDEA Exchange and their program was approved. The needle exchange was supposed to kick off in April but was delayed due to COVID-19.

During a mock run through of the SSP, Heather Henderson, MA, CAS (second from left), USF Applied Medical Anthropology PhD Candidate and director of social medicine programs for Tampa General Hospital, hands a prop to mock patients, members of the community in remission from a substance use disorder, to represent the needle exchange.

In preparation for the official start of the program in December, the USF Health and Pioneer team met in the University Square Mall parking lot with two members of the community in remission from a substance use disorder serving on the SSP advisory board, to do a mock run through and receive their feedback. “This was really great,” said one of the mock patients. “You guys came across that you care and you’re nonjudgmental.”

TBSM will be joined at the needle exchange by USF Health College of Public Health and USF Applied Medical Anthropology students to create a true interprofessional effort to make life better for people in the community. “Preventing acquisition of HIV/HCV requires a complex understanding of the interconnection between biomedical and social dimensions of infectious disease,” said Bernice McCoy, MPH, USF PhD Candidate in Applied Anthropology. “These students will apply both epidemiological and ethnographic methods to contextually assess our SSP’s potential impact and further explore the drug-using habits of PWID. Through this assessment that we can and identify facilitators and barriers towards HIV/HCV risk-reduction within the Tampa Bay community.”

The Opioid Crisis in Florida          

According to the National Institute on Drug Abuse, nearly 68% of the 4,698 reported drug overdose deaths in Florida involved opioids in 2018—a total of 3,189 fatalities (Figure 1).

Figure 1. Number of drug and opioid-involved overdose deaths in Florida. Deaths may have involved more than one substance. Source: CDC WONDER

The increase in substance use has resulted in consequent increases in injection drug use across the country. This has caused not only large increases in overdose deaths, but also the transmission of blood-borne diseases. According to the CDC, the majority of new acute hepatitis C virus (HCV) infections are due to injection drug use and Florida is in the top 10 states with the highest rates of infection. According to the Florida Department of Health HIV/AIDS Surveillance Program, about 7% of the new diagnoses of HIV in Florida in 2018 were from injection drug use (IDU) (Figure 2) and 11% of persons living with an HIV diagnosis were persons who inject drugs (PWID) (Figure 3).

Figure 2. HIV modes of exposure in 2018. Source: National HIV Behavioral Surveillance System (NHBS).

Figure 3. The number of persons who inject drugs (PWID) living with an HIV diagnosis in Florida in 2018. Source: NHBS.

According to the CDC, the HIV burden in Florida is the highest in Broward, Duval, Hillsborough (Figure 4), Miami-Dade, Orange, Palm Beach, and Pinellas. It was announced in the February 2019 State of the Union Address that these counties are a part of 57 jurisdictions that are the focus of the Trump administration’s, “Ending the HIV Epidemic: A Plan for America” or EHE initiative, which aims to end the HIV epidemic in the United States by 2030.

Figure 4. Hillsborough County is one of Florida’s HIV hotspots. Source: NHBS.

The IDEA Exchange

On July 1, 2016, after years of struggling to win legislative approval, Miami-Dade became the first county in Florida with a legal hypodermic needle exchange program and on December 1, 2016, World AIDS Day, the IDEA Exchange opened its doors as a pilot program. The IDEA Exchange in Miami was started by Hansel Tookes, MD, MPH, an assistant professor at the University of Miami’s Miller School of Medicine and principle director of its harm reduction research group. NBC Miami reported in June 2019 that the Miami program has disposed of more than 317,000 used needles since it received temporary authorization from lawmakers in 2016. The program also distributes naloxone and Tookes told the Miami Herald in November 2019 that since March 2017, “the IDEA Exchange has handed out 2,871 boxes of the drug and those who have taken naloxone from the clinic to carry with them have reported 1,529 overdose reversals in that time.” Miami is the only place in Florida seeing a decrease in opioid-related mortality while death tolls spike across the state.

Video by Torie Doll, USF Health Communications & Marketing, with interview footage assistance provided by Ian Vancattenburch, Movie Magic Productions.

The projects of three USF Health researchers are among the 23 chosen across USF to explore issues in systemic inequality, economic and health disparities, Black history and contemporary challenges for funding.

The projects were chosen by the USF Research Task Force on Understanding and Addressing Blackness and Anti-Black Racism in our Local, National and International Communities, and are part of an effort to address racial issues and attitudes on a local, national and global scale.

Below are overviews of the three USF Health projects; click here for the complete list of projects :

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Exploring Unique Experiences and Needs of African American/Black Pregnant Women.

Principal Investigator: Vanessa Hux, Morsani College of Medicine

Community Partner: Tampa General Hospital

Black women have higher rates of pregnancy complications and maternal morbidity and mortality. Interpersonal and systemic discrimination may contribute to these differences though the exact mechanisms remain unclear. In this pilot study, the project explores the interpersonal and systemic experiences of Black women and their contribution to pregnancy outcomes and prenatal care. Fifty self-identified Black pregnant women in the late second to early third trimester of pregnancy will be asked to complete a survey on trauma history and gendered racial microaggressions. The researchers will also collect hair samples to measure cortisol, a hormone used to examine biologic mechanisms of stress. This pilot work will aid in characterizing the associations between trauma, microaggressions and the production of cortisol; assessing the pathways by which trauma and microaggressions influence pregnancy outcomes; and determine the specific needs and experiences of Black women in prenatal care.

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Gut Microbiota Composition and Function During Pregnancy and Lactation in Rwandan Mothers.

Principal Investigator: Adetola Louis-Jacques, Morsani College of Medicine

Community Partner: Rwanda Medical Research Center

The postpartum period is a window of opportunity to address prevention of cardiometabolic diseases (CMD), a leading cause of mortality among Black women in all countries. Breastfeeding has been associated with a decreased risk of CMD. The project will investigate the impact of lactation on gut microbiota function in Rwandan mothers in the postpartum as a step towards understanding the underlying mechanism of lactation’s long-term benefits.

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Increasing Job Opportunities for Young Black Fathers to Improve Child and Community Health.

Principal Investigator: Ronee Wilson, College of Public Health

Community Partner: REACHUP, Inc.

Inconsistent employment and unstable finances hinder young Black fathers’ ability to develop healthy relationships with their children. This project seeks to address unemployment and underemployment among young Black fathers by providing the infrastructure for these men to fill employability skills gaps in manufacturing industries. Through interviews with young Black fathers and human resources professionals and executives at manufacturing firms, the researcher will examine how family health practices of young fathers differ in times of stable employment compared to unemployment and underemployment; what employability skills do young Black fathers possess; and to what extent are employers actively committed to and engaged in recruiting and hiring young Black men.