This story originally published on April 21, 2015 in observance of the COPH’s 30^th anniversary celebration.

Three Distinguished USF Health Professors in the Department of Global Health at the USF College of Public Health – Drs. Tom Unnasch, John Adams and Dennis Kyle – are ranked among the university’s best externally-funded investigators in terms of research dollars, and two are in the top five. A major focus of their research is malaria.

A fourth Global Health professor, Dr. Michael White, published a groundbreaking study just last month that may revolutionize the global fight against malaria.

Unnasch, the department chair, said much of Global Health’s research funding comes from external grants from the National Institutes of Health, primarily the National Institute of Allergy and Infectious Diseases.

The Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation has come through with what he called “a substantial portfolio of funding”: a $4.5-million grant to Adams this year for developing new drugs and researching new genetic targets for malaria.

Kyle and Adams also have established collaborations with the Draper Laboratory to conduct research with artificial livers to study malaria in livers, which also is funded by the Gates Foundation, Unnasch said.

The combination of expertise and generous funding has helped put the department on the global cutting edge and in the thick of international connections that will help keep it there.

“The department is becoming quite well-known now as a research institution for malaria and other vector-borne diseases,” Unnasch said. “We have lots of good collaborations with people in Thailand at Mahidol University, and a lot of collaborations with people in Africa. There’s also quite a bit of contact between our department and people in the mosquito control field here in the state of Florida.”

Unnasch said those include regular work with the Florida Mosquito Control Association (of which Unnasch is on the board of directors), the Department of Health Laboratories, the Florida Department of Health, and various research projects with mosquito control in Hillsborough, Pasco, Manatee, Volusia and St. Johns counties, as well as with the Florida Keys Mosquito Control District in Monroe County.

For mosquito researchers, Unnasch said, the reason is obvious. For everyone else, it might be alarming.

“Florida’s the best place in the country if you want to do research on mosquito-transmitted diseases,” he said. “There are four arthropod-borne viruses, or arbovirus, infections that occur in the United States, and three out of the four are endemic to Florida. That’s why Florida spends $75-100 million a year on mosquito control. Only California spends more.”

Last month, the College of Public Health made headlines as Dr. Michael White, a professor in the College of Public Health’s Department of Global Health and the Morsani College of Medicine’s Department of Molecular Medicine, led a team of researchers that became the first to uncover part of the mysterious process by which malaria-related parasites spread at explosive and deadly rates inside humans and other animals.

As drug-resistant malaria threatens to become a major public health crisis, the findings could potentially lead to a powerful new treatment for malaria-caused illnesses that kill more than 600,000 people a year.

In a study published online March 3 in the high-impact journal PLOS Biology, the USF researchers and their colleagues at the University of Georgia discovered how these ancient parasites manage to replicate their chromosomes up to thousands of times before spinning off into daughter cells with perfect similitude – all the while avoiding cell death.

Malaria caused about 207 million cases and 627,000 deaths in 2012, according to the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention.  About 3.2 billion people, or nearly half the world’s population, are at risk of malaria, according to the World Health Organization.

White said that this study, which he called the first for a USF Health laboratory in publishing original research in PLOS Biology, will help get more potential treatments in the pipeline.

“The more we understand their vulnerability,” he said of the parasites, “the better chance we can keep that pipeline full.”

With the collective efforts and expertise of Drs. Adams, Kyle, Unnasch and White, the USF College of Public Health will remain on the front lines of the fight against one of the world’s most daunting health threats.

Related stories:
USF-led study sheds light on how malaria parasites grow exponentially
New antimalarial drug with novel mechanism of action
Dr. Dennis Kyle receives NIH award to understand extreme drug resistance in malaria
Dr. John Adams leads workshop for Gates Foundation scientists conducting malaria research

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The new collaborating center will focus on diagnostics needed to verify progress toward global elimination of the disabling parasitic infection onchocerciasis

TAMPA, Fla. (June 28, 2018) – The Pan American Health Organization/World Health Organization (PAHO/WHO) has designated the University of South Florida College of Public Health’s Department of Global Health as the world’s only Collaborating Centre for Onchocerciasis Diagnostics.

Thomas Unnasch, PhD, chair of global health and distinguished university professor, will serve as the director of the new center, which will focus on the disabling parasitic infection onchocerciasis, commonly known as river blindness – the second leading cause of infectious blindness worldwide.  WHO designations are given to laboratories or institutions with a history of collaboration with WHO and active research programs supported by external funding from other sources.

“This center is unique in the world,” Unnasch said. “There are currently 88 active WHO collaborating centers in the United States. The largest number of these — about 20 percent — are at the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention in Atlanta. These cover all aspects of health, from emerging infectious diseases to social determinants of health.”

Unnasch is one of the world’s leading experts on onchocerciasis, which is spread by the bite of a black fly that breeds in fast-flowing rivers. His more than 20 years of research on the parasitic affliction has taken him to Central America, South America and Africa and been supported by the National Institutes of Health, the National Science Foundation, the Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation and the Task Force for Global Health, as well as WHO.

USF Health’s Thomas Unnasch, PhD (first row, second from right), one of the world’s leading experts on onchocerciasis, with a local team in Uganda employed to help with collection and control of the black flies that spread the sight-robbing parasitic infection. The photo was taken May 2016 along the Aswa River outside a village where the field work was done. (Photo courtesy of Dr. Unnasch)

“This designation is a great honor,” he said. “It will allow us to expand the logistical and technical support activities that we conduct for the laboratories established by The Carter Center in Africa and Latin America to include additional countries and laboratories. All activities are aimed at providing diagnostic support to verify onchocerciasis elimination.”

According to the CDC, river blindness is categorized as a neglected tropical disease — one that causes substantial illness for more than one billion people globally, especially among those living in poverty. The disease spread by black flies in the genus Simulium, and those infected may experience skin rashes, severe itching, large nodules under the skin caused by adult worms living below the skin and, eventually, blindness. Infected adults may take the antiparasitic medication ivermectin to destroy the larvae living in the body; however, there is no approved treatment for children under age 5.

“It is always an honor to be recognized by the World Health Organization as a center of excellence,” said Donna Petersen, dean of the USF College of Public Health. “We are already home to the WHO Collaborating Center for Social Marketing.  Adding this one dedicated to the eradication of a global scourge is a clear testament to the excellent work conducted by our faculty and to the particularly stellar reputation earned over many years of devoted effort by Dr. Unnasch.”

Media Contact:  Natalie D. Preston, USF College of Public Health, (813) 974-7714, or npreston@health.usf.edu

-USF College of Public Health-
Established in 1984 as the first college of public health in the State of Florida, the USF College of Public Health is a recognized leader in community health, online education, maternal and child health, social marketing, and global infectious disease research. Ranked as the #1 public health degree program in the state by U.S. News & World Report, the college offers multiple concentrations that lead to BSPH, MHA, MPH, MSPH, DrPH, and PhD degrees, as well as several dual degrees, graduate certificates and online programs. To learn more about the college, visit www.publichealth.usf.edu.

 -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 College of Pharmacy, the School of Physical Therapy and Rehabilitation Sciences, the Biomedical Sciences Graduate and Postdoctoral Programs, and USF’s multispecialty physicians group. The University of South Florida, established in 1956 and located in Tampa, is a high-impact, global research university dedicated to student success. USF is ranked in the Top 30 nationally for research expenditures among public universities, according to the National Science Foundation. For more information, visit www.health.usf.edu

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The USF Office of Graduate Studies presented its 10^th Annual Graduate Research Symposium on March 21 at the Marshall Student Center.

The event, sponsored by the Graduate and Professional Student Counsel and Research One, showcased graduate students across all disciplines. This year, 17 USF College of Public Health students participated.

The Graduate Research Symposium took place in the Marshall Student Center and included students from all disciplines across campus. (Photo by Caitlin Keough)

MPH student Katherine Lesser’s research, “Eliminating the Strain: Examining Immunization Policies at Accredited Florida Postsecondary Institutions” examined the discrepancies in immunization requirements for students at universities and colleges in Florida.

“I wanted to see if any of the Florida colleges had any of the same immunization policies,” she said.

Lesser, specializing in epidemiology and global communicable diseases, examined some of Florida’s laws stating that individuals at post-secondary institutes with on campus dwellings need to be vaccinated against meningococcal, meningitis, and hepatitis B unless they opt-out with a waiver.

“I thought that was interesting because another Florida statute for students entering daycare through post-secondary education, including childcare, daycare, pre-k and k-12 vaccines, require much more than meningitis and hepatitis B,” Lesser said.

Katherine Lesser. (Photo by Caitlin Keough)

Lesser segmented the universities and colleges in Florida by accreditation, looking specifically at those accredited by the Southern Association of Colleges and Schools Commission on Colleges, and split them even further between public and private institutions.

She conducted research of each institution’s vaccine requirements for incoming students.

“Most had immunizations forms, the only ones I found that didn’t were seminary schools,” Lesser said.

She found that Florida college systems had vaccination requirements, but that they were very specific to those in the health science professions.

“There is a lot of variation that exists between the schools,” Lesser said. “Not one institution has the same as the other, which I find very concerning especially because these are all highly contagious diseases that can be prevented by vaccines.”

She also found that the 12 Florida State University System institutions required hepatitis and meningitis by law, and that four required a TB screening for international students where TB is endemic.

“I suggest that the state of Florida create a cohesive immunization sheet that is used throughout all colleges and universities. From what I understand, no one institution has the same as the other and that is a huge issue,” Lesser said.

Vaccination is Lesser’s public health passion and in February, she, along with other classmates, went to Washington, D.C. to speak with Florida’s congressional members and senators regarding the need for continued funding and global support for the UN Foundation’s, Shot@Life, an organization advocating for childhood vaccines worldwide.

“Vaccines are such a vital part of public health, everyone should get them and support them,” Lesser said. “I want people to understand them, especially since they are like a ‘best buy’ of public health, as The Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation describes them. Most are affordable and with vaccines we’ve made so much progress, for example, Polio is only endemic in three countries. So, it’s clear that vaccines do so much good for the world and it’s an incredibly important topic.”

For environmental and occupational health graduate student Carli, her research, “USF Health Faculty & Staff Health & Well-being Assessment: Highlighting The Current” was driven by a personal experience.

“Occupational health and safety is my passion,” Carli said. “I have three years of experience working as a physician in my home country [Indonesia] where my best friend’s father developed thyroid cancer because of working in a fertilizer factory. Within two years of his retirement date, he found out he had cancer. He assessed that many of colleagues had the same issue. Occupational related diseases always happen near retirement, but after you end up with the issue there is not much that can be done because it’s already late.”

She decided to assess the health and wellness of USF Health’s faculty and staff.

“University workers don’t realize it, but they are workers too,” she said. “The University is a workplace and the federal government’s OSHA department says that it is an obligation for the employer to take care of the health and wellness of the employees.”

Using the CDC’s worksite questionnaire of 90 questions, Carli assessed the health and wellness of the workers and found that, overall, USF Health is taking strides in addressing employee wellness.

“Most of the workers of USF Health are entering their later years of life and are over age 50,” she said.

The four common complaints noted by USF Health employees were: hypertension, hypercholesterolemia, hyperglycemia—high blood glucose, and musculoskeletal issues.

Carli. (Photo by Caitlin Keough)

Carli assessed that staff also stressed the desire to have classes on physical activity, healthy eating, and ergonomics.

“This is the one department that allows its workers to access the recreation center at the WELL. In other departments at USF employees must pay to utilize the recreation center, but at USF Health it’s accessed for free. I really appreciate that USF Health thinks about the health and wellness of the workers,” she said.

She said she found that USF Health has done a great job addressing those desires and hopes the same wellness efforts will be offered to employees across campus.

“I hope that later USF as a whole will provide the opportunity its staff and faculty to use the gym,” she said.

(Photo by Caitlin Keough)

The complete list of College of Public Health participants include:

Student Affairs and Student Success

Taylor Grimm
Success and Wellness Coaching: Holistic wellness approach to student success

Environmental and Occupational Health

Carli
USF Health Faculty & Staff Health & Well-being Assessment: Highlighting The Current

Community and Family Health

Melody Chavez-Robben
Quality of Life among Hispanic Cancer Survivors

Alexis Barr
Promoting and Supporting Breastfeeding in the Hospital: Factors Associated with Exclusive Breastfeeding at One Month among WIC Participants

Janelle Barrera Ikan
School-level Factors Associated with Obesity: A Systematic Review of Longitudinal Observational Studies

Tara Foti
Quality of Life is Associated With Glucose Control Trends Among Diabetic REMEDIES4D Trial Participants: A Secondary Data Analysis

Lydia Mezenghie
Colorectal Cancer Screening among African Americans

Chinyere Reid
Improving Florida’s Birth Certificate Accuracy: A Pilot Initiative

Acadia Webber
Food, Nutrients, and Diet Quality in Children with Autism Spectrum Disorder in Florida

Global Health

Celina Flocks Monaghan
Navigating New Routes: Assessing Barriers to Medical Care in Congolese Refugee Populations of Tampa, Florida

Siriuk Changrob
Association of Immunologic Memory to Polymorphic Haplotypes of Plasmodium vivax Duffy Binding Protein in Low Malaria Transmission Area of Thailand

Muhammad Khalid
Heterologous expression and purification of Plasmodium falciparum protein kinase ABCk2 (PfABCk2) as a potential drug target

Asmita Mhaskar
Homeopathy: What are patients saying?

James Muncy
Perceptions of Zika Virus Among USF Students

Epidemiology and Global Health

Katherine Lesser
Eliminating the Strain: Examining Immunization Policies at Accredited Florida Postsecondary Institutions

Epidemiology and Biostatistics

Linh Duong
Assessing Hepatitis C Screening Completion Rates Using Electronic Medical Records from the USF Health System in Tampa, Florida

Mitra Kothari
Trends in the Prevalence of Hypertension Among Those Who Have Diabetes in U.S. Adults: An NHANES Data Analysis

Related Media:
Photo album by Ellen Kent

Story by Anna Mayor, USF College of Public Health

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USF College of Public Health’s Dr. Robert Novak is aiming to reduce the transmission of malaria in Cambodia with the help of drone technology.

His Gates Foundation funded research is currently underway in Mekong River Subregio in Cambodia, an area Novak says is experiencing both antimalarial drug resistance, as well as mosquito insecticide resistance.

“It’s really a major challenge to come up with alternatives,” he said. “Our goal is to reduce transmission.”

Novak and the field team in the Soyas village. (Photo courtesy of Dr. Robert Novak)

Novak, a professor of global health, and his team are using drones as part of a project to locate mosquitoes in their larval aquatic stages in areas where they are the most concentrated, immobile and accessible—an effort he’s coined the “CIA approach” to mosquito control.

“The whole philosophy to using this approach is to identify where there are pockets or habitats that are producing larvae and try to control them before they become winged mobile adults and disperse over the ecosystem,” Novak said.

The field team prepping the drone for flight. (Photo courtesy of Dr. Robert Novak)

The research, which begin in early 2016 is now in its second stage, with funding through 2018 and the possibility of continuous funding thereafter.

Novak said their first step is to capture unique “spectral signatures”—pictures of mosquito larvae in an aquatic environment—which are then uploaded to the drones for capturing a broader area of surveillance.

Using a handheld device called a spectrophotometer, Novak and his team capture a 30 cm square image of what a mosquito aquatic habitat looks like at ground level.

“We can get a unique signature based on the reflectance of light,” Novak said.

An example of an Anopheles habitat and where mosquitoes reproduce. (Photo courtesy of Dr. Robert Novak)

This spectral signature is then uploaded to the drone which allows his team to find and identify specifically all similar aquatic habits producing mosquitoes.

“The whole thing is scale up,” Novak said. “We get a signature of where the mosquitoes are, upload that to a drone, which gives us an image of a larger area, about five to ten miles, and then for really scaling up to broader areas or even regions we utilize submeter satellite data.”

Graphic highlighting how the drones assist in locating the mosquito aquatic habitats. (Photo courtesy of Dr. Robert Novak)

Silvia Alvarez, a research coordinator and COPH alumna, worked to collect data in the field this past summer.

“Being able to be part of an extraordinary team both from USF and Cambodian locals has been amazing,” Alvarez said. “Transferring the knowledge from one side to another has been gratifying. Cambodians have been very welcoming and helpful with this project.”

Silvia Alvarez using a spectrophotometer (blue device) to capture unique signatures the drones utilize in data collection. (Photo courtesy of Silvia Alvarez)

The lab Novak and his team use as a home base while working in Mekong, Cambodia. (Photo courtesy of Dr. Robert Novak)

“My Cambodian team are exceptionally good, they are doing all the drone and associated field work now,” he said. “We taught them to fly and they do the download, create the space and flight path of the drone; the first trip was just to train people and the Cambodians were really good. I was so happy with that.”

Novak said once the drones have identified all the potential mosquito larvae in a given area, the next phase will be to use satellites to capture an image of a larger region and then treat.

“This [research] is really very unique; it’s become important because of malarial resistance to drug treatment and insecticides,” he said. “This could be a viable addition to help reduce the risk of transmission, so we’re really excited about it.”

Story by Anna Mayor, USF College of Public Health

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USF College of Public Health students Caitlin Wolfe and Shahrzad Zamani represented University of South Florida at the Annual Delta Omega Student Poster Session in Atlanta.

The prestigious Delta Omega Honorary Society in Public Health holds the poster session to encourage and recognize the public health leaders of tomorrow. Zamani’s study is the first and only undergraduate student research to ever be presented at the poster session.

Each year, nineteen students are selected from thousands of abstracts nationwide to present their research. This year’s presentations were held during the Delta Omega Student Poster Session at the annual American Public Health Association (APHA) on Nov. 6.

Students Shahrzad Zamani and Caitlin Wolfe with their awards at the Delta Omega Student Poster Session (Photo by Ellen Kent).

Undergraduate student Zamani presented her research on health and behavior factors that will decrease the infant mortality rate (IMR) in the U.S.

Her research titled “Role of Baby Boxes in Lowering Infant Mortality Rate” compares the IMR between several developed countries and defines the role of baby boxes as a function in lowering IMR in the U.S. Her main focus was evaluating the application and accessibility of baby boxes in the U.S.

The U.S. has one of the highest IMR among all developed countries. In contrast, Finland has the lowest IMR among all countries. Zamani said she was curious about the factors leading to such low IMR statistics. She found one reason for Finland’s success in infant care is providing free baby boxes to new parent(s) that are filled with infant care necessities and double as infant beds. Baby boxes are proven to lower the Sudden Infant Death Syndrome by providing resources and information about vital infant care and practicing safe sleep.

Shahrzad Zamani presenting her research at the Delta Omega Poster session (Photo courtesy of Zamani).

“The presentation was great,” she said. “During my poster presentation, I was visited by the Delta Omega representative where we talked about the future implications of my research.”

Zamani said she was a bit intimidated to be the first and only undergraduate presenter, but that it was an honor to represent her college.

“This year, the Tau Chapter at USF COPH was chosen as the chapter of the year and it was very exciting to be a representative of this chapter,” she said. “I am also glad that I could represent the college for all that they have done for me and show my Bull pride!”

She said it was inspiring to see so many people in a variety of public health fields joining each other to share ideas and learn new concepts at APHA and the Delta Omega reception.

“The Delta Omega reception was a friendly environment where we received recognition. During the dinner, we were able to connect with public health students from across the country and exchange ideas,” Zamani said. “Through my workforce and leadership development course, I had set up a LinkedIn profile which was very useful for networking. I was able to instantly connect with people and expand my contacts.”

Undergraduate student Shahrzad Zamani at the COPH booth at APHA (Photo by Ellen Kent).

Wolfe, who is earning a PhD focused on global health, presented her work as an epidemiologist with the World Health Organization’s Ebola Response Team in Liberia.

“In terms of my APHA abstract, contact tracing is one of the key, on-the-ground actions necessary for halting Ebola Virus Disease (EVD) transmission, and it needs to be implemented as soon as possible after an Ebola case is identified,” she said. “Throughout the epidemic, we routinely found that there were delays in initiating contact tracing ranging from a few days to over a week, often due to limited resources in Liberia.”

To investigate this further, Wolfe and her team created and conducted contact tracing resource surveys that were sent out to field teams to identify the major barriers to rapid and effective implementation of contact tracing methods.

Shortly after they conducted these surveys, another small cluster of Ebola flared up in Monrovia, Liberia. Some of the lessons learned from previous clusters were employed to address the challenges that were identified from the surveys. Using the enhanced methods, more than 150 contacts were identified within 48 hours, and those initially missing were located within days. Contacts were closely monitored and promptly tested if symptomatic. No contacts developed EVD nor were lost to follow-up. Based on the survey responses and the results of the enhanced monitoring methods, they were able to provide key recommendations for establishing effective contact tracing in the future.

Doctoral student Caitlin Wolfe, MPH, presenting her research at the Delta Omega Poster session (Photo courtesy of Wolfe).

Wolfe said the presentation went well and that she was able to network with fellow peers who are researching similar topics.

“I met some fellow Ebola fighters and we were able to share our stories while discussing the findings from this research and what it means moving forward,” she said. “Additionally, I met someone from the National Association of County and City Health Officials who was very interested in the preparedness aspects of the key recommendations that resulted from our findings.”

If her abstracts are accepted, Wolfe said that she looks forward to presenting at APHA again with her new research and doctoral dissertation focused more on schistosomiasis, a disease caused by infection with freshwater parasitic worms in certain tropical/subtropical countries.

“I’m also interested in presenting at an oral session one day, if the opportunity arises. I was pleasantly surprised to receive the nomination to submit my abstract and represent USF at the Delta Omega session and was thrilled when it was accepted,” Wolfe said. “It was an honor to represent the COPH and the Tau chapter, as well as witness the Tau chapter receive its own honors at the Delta Omega award ceremony.”

View related article here.

Story by Caitlin Keough, USF College of Public Health

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USF College of Public Health’s Dr. Michael White, Distinguished USF Health Professor in the Department of Global Health, has been funded with more than $2.7 million to examine the developmental mechanisms responsible for tissue cyst formation of Toxoplasma gondii.

The five year R01 National Institute of Health grant will allow White and his team to work toward the development of a new drug or vaccine treatment to prevent diseases caused by Toxoplasma and its relatives from the Apicomplexa family, according to White.

Michael White, PhD, is one of the world’s leading experts on the malaria-related parasites T. gondii. (Photo courtesy of USF Health)

The Centers for Disease Control and Prevention named Toxoplasma one of the five most neglected parasitic diseases.

“About one third of the world population is infected by Toxoplasma, and while the immune system of healthy people is able to control these infections, anyone with a compromised immune response is susceptible to a disease that can lead to death,” White said.

White said that even in healthy people, Toxoplasma, which prefers to infect the brain, could cause neurological complications including potential behavioral changes and other neurological complications.

“Once an individual is infected with Toxoplasma they are infected for the rest of their life,” he said. “A healthy immune system cannot eliminate the Toxoplasma cysts that will reside in the brain and muscle of infected people and no current treatment can eliminate this type of infection.”

Toxoplasma infection is contracted from contaminated meat products made from infected animals, water or soil contaminated by cats­­—which are the major carrier of the pathogen—and from mother to baby during pregnancy.

Toxoplasma gondii. (Photo source: Wikimedia Commons)

White said his research will focus on how Toxoplasma parasites switch from reproducing to dormancy in the tissue cyst, which he says is effectively invisible to the immune system and untreatable.

“The Toxoplasma biology that underlies chronic disease is a reversible transformation of the asexual replicating tachyzoite into the latent bradyzoite stage,” White said. “This critical developmental transition is accompanied by significant changes in gene expression controlled by poorly defined transcriptional mechanisms.”

White and his team hypothesize that there is a transcriptional network that directs the competing needs of tachyzoite growth against the development of the tissue cyst required for parasite transmission.

To understand the transcriptional network, White said, their research will focus on two aims: tachyzoite cell cycle repressors and how they control bradyzoite gene expression and how those mechanisms influence parasite development in animals.

“We have found by studying the function of AP2 [tachyzoite cell cycle repressors] factors in Toxoplasma that we can scramble them—delete specific AP2 genes or overexpress AP2 genes in the parasite—in ways that causes the parasite to missexpress its genes during an infection,” he said. “The consequence of this scrambling is very exciting as we have found in mouse models that this scrambling of AP2 factors helps the mouse immune system better fight the infection, and, importantly, help the immune system to prevent the cyst form that is responsible for life long infections.”

It was based on the success of these early studies, White said, that prompted the National Health Institutes to award him and his team this five-year grant in order to continue the studies on AP2 factors.

Students, staff and professionals involved in the grant research will also collaborate with the School of Medicine at Indiana University and University of California Riverside to come up with solutions to combat Toxoplasma gondii infections, such as through a vaccine based on scrambling the parasite’s transcriptional network, according to White.

“More than 50 million individuals in the U.S. are chronically infected with Toxoplasma gondii and thousands of healthy individuals develop eye disease leading to permanent vision loss,” White said. “Toxoplasma gondii infections continue to be a public health hazard for millions of individuals that contact this pathogen annually.”

Story by Anna Mayor, USF College of Public Health

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USF College of Public Health alumna Kelly Carpenter heard about public health years before studying it and it has been stuck in her head ever since.

“I wanted to specialize in a region more than I wanted to specialize in one area of public health,” Kelly Carpenter said. “We are taught that it’s the community, our stakeholders that drive the success of any intervention. So I wanted to work from within communities in Latin America and learn from them about what public health issues were affecting the health and the well-being of their families and neighbors.”

Alumna Kelly Carpenter, MPH (Photo courtesy of Carpenter).

While earning her undergraduate degree in Spanish at Plymouth State University, she began to dive more deeply into the history and culture of the language she was studying.

“At a certain point in language study, you stop focusing on new vocabulary and begin to learn about literature, history, economics and politics. That opened a whole new world for me. From there, I seized every opportunity that I could to travel to Latin American countries.”

Carpenter said that during these trips is when public health returned to the forefront of her mind, “it was everywhere.”

After graduating with her BA in Spanish, Carpenter started her MPH degree at the COPH.

“The global health program at the COPH really spoke to me, it was a culmination of each public health discipline within an international context,” she said.

One of Carpenter’s most proud accomplishments at the COPH was being able to participate in a research project with students and professors in her cohort. During the project they analyzed and published a paper on Latino perceptions of caregiver burden. Their findings support the inclusion of caregivers in disease management programs for patients with co-morbid chronic illness and minor depression.

While at the COPH, Carpenter said she was inspired by Dr. Jaime Corvin and Dr. Ismael Hoare, assistant professors in the Department of Global Health.

“Dr. Hoare made sure that we weren’t just studying from a textbook, but that we were really thinking about when it was time to apply these lessons, not just outside of the classroom, but outside of our own communities,” she said. “Dr. Corvin is a mentor by nature.  She opened the door to her students to play an active role in her research projects and gain an active, hands-on experience to continue the learning outside of the classroom.”

Kelly Carpenter during her international field experience presentation (Photo courtesy of Carpenter).

After completing her IFE through the Foundation for Sustainable Development’s (FSD) site in Cochabamba, Bolivia, Carpenter was determined to pursue her passion for working in Latin America. She took a position working for FSD in Nicaragua mentoring student interns in asset-based community development projects with local health centers and grassroots NGO’s. She also assisted in the direct strengthening of the communities that they worked with through workshops, proposal development and grant application training.

Kelly Carpenter on her last day in Bolivia (Photo courtesy of Carpenter).

Kelly Carpenter collecting water samples in Bolivia during her international field experience (Photo courtesy of Carpenter).

Kelly Carpenter in Salar, Bolivia (Photo courtesy of Carpenter).

Carpenter gained a deep love for Nicaragua, the spirit and resourcefulness of the people who live there. She is deeply invested in working towards sustainable development and improving health and well-being within the community.

Carpenter has recently accepted a position as the Nicaragua program director with Global Student Embassy working directly with project partners and community stakeholders in capacity building and program development. She will spearhead new local program initiatives geared towards regenerative agriculture, food security and nutrition, and leadership development in rural communities in Nicaragua.

Global Student Embassy conducting a parent meeting in Nicaragua (Photo courtesy of Carpenter).

Internalizing the words “Our Practice is Our Passion” and taking a leap of faith in pursuit of possibility has paid off.

Students creating a motivational tree during a Global Student Embassy youth leadership class (Photo courtesy of Carpenter).

Carpenter said she continues to rely on the lessons learned from COPH’s global health practice program every day and that she even brought her textbooks with her as guiding points.

“I am currently rewriting and rebuilding our program using the same frameworks, structures and strategies that I learned in my global health courses,” she said. “I always go back to my basics and insist that we do an extensive needs assessment and build in structures for monitoring and evaluating, starting from the beginning of the project. I am dedicated to ensuring that we never implement a project in a community that has not expressly demonstrated need and interest; we see this too often with international NGO’s.”

In the future, Carpenter hopes to develop more partnerships with non-profits internationally and expand her territory to include additional Latin American sites.

“Living in Nicaragua you get used to the idea that everything changes minute by minute and you never know what’s around the corner. I am open to all of it,” she said. “I love seeing how I can pull all these things together and continue to build a stimulating, intriguing and inspiring career path.”

Story by Caitlin Keough, USF College of Public Health

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“As a completely online MPH program student, I was proud of myself that I could earn my degree while working full-time,” said USF College of Public Health alumna Sydney Henderson.

Born and raised in Loveland, Colo., Henderson attended Colorado State University and earned her BS in microbiology in 2009 and then a BS in clinical laboratory science from University of Nebraska Medical Center in 2011.

Henderson was introduced to the field of public health during her undergraduate career.

Alumna Sydney Henderson, MPH (Photo courtesy of Henderson).

“The preventative nature of public health is what really interests me. Trying to protect individuals in our communities, hospitals, and areas worldwide from various public health problems is crucial,” she said.

After working in a clinical microbiology laboratory she realized she wanted to get into the field of infection prevention and found the COPH’s MPH program with a concentration in infection control.

“I didn’t find any other programs that had a concentration in infection control, so I became really interested the COPH’s program for that specific reason. The program matched up perfectly with my goal of becoming an infection preventionist and becoming CIC certified,” Henderson said.

“I loved that it was all online and could work full-time while completing the program. It’s really geared towards individuals who are already working professionals and are looking to further their career or change careers,” she said. “The program really prepared me to become an infection preventionist.”

During her time in the program, Henderson said that her advisor Dr. Donna Haiduven, associate professor in the Department of Global Health, inspired her the most.

“She showed me that while the field of infection prevention has been geared towards nursing that I could also break into the field of infection prevention without a nursing degree” she said. “Dr. Haiduven’s classes were also incredibly helpful and contributed most to my knowledge base that I have now.”

Dr. Donna Haiduven and Sydney Henderson in Denver (Photo courtesy of Haiduven).

After graduating in 2015, Henderson was hired as an infection preventionist at Presbyterian St. Luke’s Medical Center and Rocky Mountain Hospital fro Children in Denver.

As an infection preventionist, she is responsible for disease surveillance throughout the hospital. She monitors hospital-acquired infections, reports diseases of interest to local and state health departments, and serves as an infection prevention subject matter expert for the entire hospital.

“I was attracted to the preventative nature of it. We work hard to implement best practices to make sure that our patients don’t get an infection in the hospital that they didn’t come in with,” she said. “These policies, procedures and practices keep patients as safe as possible during their stay.”

One of her proudest professional achievements to date was her team and hospital staff’s response to a child admitted to the hospital with measles.

“We were able to get the child isolated immediately upon admission,” Henderson said. “Because of our immediate actions we didn’t have any ill effects from the case, such as associated staff or patient exposures.”

Sydney Henderson and her Infection Prevention team at the 2017 National Association for Professionals in Infection Control and Epidemiology conference in Portland, Oregon. (Photo courtesy of Henderson).

Henderson said that in the future she would like to be in a managerial or director of infection prevention position. She would also like the opportunity to present a verbal abstract or presentation at the annual national Association for Professionals in Infection Control and Epidemiology conference.

Story by Caitlin Keough, USF College of Public Health

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The time has come for former USF College of Public Health Department of Global Health professor Dr. Wilbur Milhous to retire, but he won’t be sitting still for too long.

Although his retirement from the COPH began August 6, Milhous has still been active in academia, teaching part-time at Clemson University.

He’s also spending time with his family in South Carolina, his original stomping grounds, where he grew up on his family’s farm in Olar, a small town with a population of less than 300.

Dr. Wilbur Milhous (far right) at the historic Mizpah Church in Beaufort’s Bridge, South Carolina with (from left) daughter Elizabeth, brother Mat, daughter Allyson, and granddaughters Lauren and Aubrey. (Photo courtesy of Milhous)

His path from the family farm to the COPH was filled with many milestones resulting in a career of more than 40 years of clinical and research experience in public health, medical microbiology and parasitology.

“Public health represents the true implementation of what we learn as scientists,” he said.

After earning his bachelors and master’s degrees from Clemson, he received his PhD in 1983 from the UNC Gillings School of Global Health. While earning his PhD he also trained at Burroughs Wellcome, currently known as Glasko-Smith Kline, where he has since gained 35 years of experience in small molecule drug development in malaria and emerging diseases.

“The complexity of the micro-organisms and the diseases they cause interested me the most,” Milhous said.

His path then led him to the Walter Reed Army Institute of Research (WRAIR), the oldest school of public health and preventive medicine in the U.S., working in experimental therapeutics for discovery, lead optimization and translational research in drug development for the Military Infectious Disease Research Program.

He also became the consultant to the Army surgeon general in medical microbiology and chief science officer for therapeutics at WRAIR.

Milhous during his first tour performing meningococcal surveillance. (Photo courtesy of U.S. Army Medical Department)

“My first public health expereince was surveillance and detection of meningococcal disease at beautiful downtown Ft. Polk, Louisiana, and an off-campus UNC MPH program while assigned to Ft. Bragg, North Carolina,” Milhous said.

But, he said it was meeting COPH Dean Donna Petersen that persuaded him to change courses and join USF.

“I met Dean Petersen in Panama and never got over it,” he said “I knew she was an amazing leader.”

He joined the faculty of the USF Global Health and Infectious Diseases Research (GHIDR) program and became a member of the Medicines for Malaria Expect Scientific Advisory Committee. He was also founding co-chair of the Committee on Global Health of the American Society of Tropical Medicine and Hygiene (ASTMH).

He said his favorite memories of the COPH came down to the people he interacted with.

“It was the opportunity to thrive and mentor great students that is my favorite,” he said. “I watched them transform into great professionals.”

Milhous and Dr. Tom Bernard during the college’s celebration of the Super Bowl. (Photo by Anna Mayor)

He also served as associate dean for research in the COPH for ten years, catapulting the COPH’s research program to one of the top at the USF and managing a multimillion dollar research portfolio.

Milhous said the COPH’s faculty and senior leadership helped to make his efforts in doing so a success.

“I was recruited [to COPH] with three of my best friends and greatest collaborators, so this was really an opportunity to work closely with people I knew in addition to being with a great academic culture with new leadership. The faculty were also very supportive during some tough family times,” he said.

As a 32-year member of the of the American Society of Tropical Medicine and Hygiene, he has received numerous honors and awards to include the ASTMH-LePrince Medal in Malariology, the Gorgas Medal in Preventive Medicine, ASTMH-Ashford Medal in Tropical Medicine, Distinguished Alumnus of UNC, USF Research Achievement Award as well as numerous military awards during 35 years of active federal service.

Milhous (second from left) and the original GHIDR faculty. (Photo courtesy of Milhous)

Milhous is also editor of ASM Antimicrobial Agents and Chemotherapy and a member of editorial boards for Journal of Clinical Microbiology and Journal of Tropical Medicine.

He has more than 170 publications with more than 10,800 citations including 14 books and book chapters and 10 therapeutic patents for parasitic diseases.

When asked what impact he hopes his research career has had, he said, “Taking some baby steps toward eradication of neglected diseases.”

While his career has no doubt contributed to the field of public health, he hopes future public health practitioners take note that it’s not always easy.

“Stay the course,” he said. “Expected the unexpected.”

Story by Anna Mayor, USF College of Public Health

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A new herd of Bulls entered the USF College of Public Health on Thursday, August 17. They arrived at orientation ready to learn and share their public health passions with others.

Epidemiology graduate student Marissa Estrada wants to explore zoonotic and infectious diseases in her MPH program. (Photo by Natalie Preston)

Marissa Estrada is one of the college’s 296 new students. At 7:40 a.m., she was the first student to arrive for orientation. Estrada is a military brat who earned a bachelor’s degree in animal sciences from Auburn University. When asked why she chose USF, Estrada asserted, “Because USF COPH is ranked #1 in the state and I wanted to move back to Florida!”

The rest of the class includes: 171 MPH, 14 MSPHs, nine MHA, 58 BSPH, and 12 PhD students.

The college also enrolled a record number of 31 new students into the DrPH program.

The incoming Class of 2017 (Photo by Natalie Preston)

Orientation day included small and large group sessions with academic and student affairs, departments, graduate and undergraduate studies, as well as a USF resource expo.

(From left) Behavioral health MPH student Rebecca joins her mom Karen in the Department of Community and Family Health. The senior Liller is a professor and director of the department’s academic graduate programs. (Photo by Caitlin Keough)

New graduate students in the Department of Health Policy and Management (Photo by Caitlin Keough)

USF hosts a Week of Welcome for all new students. This year, the COPH joined in the festivities to promote the college’s nationally ranked bachelor’s degree and new Health Scholars Program.

Despite the record heat temperature on Aug. 22, more than 800 students showed up on the Marshall Student Center lawn to test their knowledge with public health Jeopardy, It’s Your Health trivia, and reproductive health games like demonstrating the proper steps for using a condom (Hint: there are 12 steps!)! Incoming freshmen also enjoyed Kona Ice, corn hole, mini drones, magic card tricks, a rock climbing wall and Rocky D. Bull.

(Photo by Natalie Preston)

(Photo by Natalie Preston)

(Photo by Natalie Preston)

(Photo by Natalie Preston)

(Photo by Natalie Preston)

(Photo by Natalie Preston)

(Photo by Natalie Preston)

Story by Natalie Preston, USF College of Public Health

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