90.5 WESA - “The two main criticisms of the Affordable Care Act marketplace were that not enough plans were participating and that premiums were too high, and this policy change … will worsen both of those problems,” said HPM’s JULIE DONOHUE. CALEB WALLACE, an HPM alum and senior director of health policy and assistant counsel at UPMC Health Plan, said the company aims to maintain stability for consumers. “This change in particular … is a little ...
Congratulations to Pitt Public Health’s team on their second place finish at the Robbins Case Competition at Baylor University. JOHN CORDIER (MHA/MBA), ZACHARY HAYES (MHA), and AMANDA WILKINS (MHA) were the students who competed in the event. HPM’s KEVIN BROOM (second from right, MHA and MHA/MBA program director) was there to cheer them on, and CHANDLER CAUFIELD (MHA/MBA) attended as an observer. She will be on the team representing us next year....
POST-GAZETTE - In this four-part, interactive feature about Pittsburgh’s changing climate, Public Health Dynamics Laboratory director MARK ROBERTS talks about modeling disasters. “We showed that, in many parts of Pittsburgh, you would hit areas where the emergency management system could not respond in the times it likes to respond to the numbers of events that occurred.”
DAILY MAIL, UK - This study, led by EPI’s REBECCA THURSTON, is one of the first of its kind to assess the impact of trauma on heart disease risk. She said, “These findings underscore the importance of psychosocial factors, such as trauma exposure, in the development of heart disease risk in midlife women.” Thurston is a professor of epidemiology, psychiatry, and psychology, and director of the Women’s Biobehavioral Health Laboratory at Pitt.
JOHN SHAFFER, assistant professor in the Department of Human Genetics at Pitt Public Health, and Seth Weinberg, an associate professor in the Department of Oral Biology at the School of Dental Medicine, received a grant award of $1.7 million from the National Institute of Dental and Craniofacial Research (NIDCR) for their project, “The Genetic Architecture of Human Facial Morphology.”
To mark his installation as the Philip Hallen Endowed Chair in Community Health and Social Justice, BCHS’s STEVEN ALBERT will revisit Rousseau’s 1754 Discourse on the Origin and Foundations of Inequality Among Men , or “Second Discourse.” We have moved beyond early philosophical speculation to an emerging science of inequality, where the emergence of hierarchy can be explored experimentally. Health disparities can be viewed through this same len...
A new way to collect and organize data could be the answer to tackling the years-long opioid overdose epidemic. The University of Pittsburgh’s Program Evaluation and Research Unit (PERU) is working with Pennsylvania officials to standardize death data from overdose victims. The purpose of the project is to provide more detailed reporting in real-time that could help show where the problem areas are. A large number of staffers are Pitt Public Heal...
HPM's LAUREN BORRELLI plans to utilize her fellowship to build industry-specific knowledge of the Korean health care market. As a Korean-American, she is excited to be able to connect her cultural heritage to her professional career.
CNBC - New California legislation prompts Nightly Business Report ’s Meg Tirrell to ask HPM’s WALLID GELLAD about California Governor Brown’s bill requiring pharma to announce 60 days before a rise of more than 16 percent over two years, and to provide justification for the hike. Locate Gellad’s comments at 17:37–18:05.
Every year our school faculty members gather for continuing education and updates on pertinent policies. They work hard all year, and students regularly tell us that it is these are the people that make their degree years so positive.
TIME MAGAZINE - Granting top honors to Pittsburgh's East Liberty & Lawrenceville neighborhoods, Time's MONEY rankings cite the steel town's reinvigorated cool factor and influx of new bars, restaurants, and hotels. They signal out the Ace Hotel (and cool bar), housed in a former YMCA where guests can play cornhole, ping pong, and video games in the old-school gym.
CNN - Despite any advantages Xtampza may have (harder to crush and abuse), “people still get addicted to oral pills. They can still take too much. They can still overdose,” said HPM’s WALLID GELLAD, co-director of the University of Pittsburgh’s Center for Pharmaceutical Policy and Prescribing. Gellad believes that there'’s more to Cigna’s new policies than a desire to combat the opioid crisis.
It is known that high blood pressure in one’s 50s puts a person at risk for dementia in later life. It's now know that hypertension in the 30s and 40s has a similar effect, but only in women. LEWIS KULLER, epidemiology professor emeritus, talks about why this unexpected research finding might be true.
This September, the Department of Infectious Diseases and Microbiology recognized student research poster winners at the annual IDM research day. Students winners were awarded prizes in various categories during the next day's IDM annual meeting and picnic at North Park.
Saumyadipta Pyne will join the Public Health Dynamics Laboratory (PHDL) as its scientific director and will also serve as an associate professor in the Department of Biostatistics, both at the University of Pittsburgh Graduate School of Public Health, beginning October 1. “I am very excited that Dr. Pyne will be joining PHDL with an associate professor appointment in our biostatistics department,” commented Shyamal Peddada, chair of the Departmen...
Congratulations to alumnus CHARLES JOHN SCHLEUPNER (IDM ’68), who has been appointed to the Dean’s Council on Advancement for the Virginia Tech Carilion School of Medicine. The council is a committee of volunteers created to advance the stature of the medical school by providing guidance, assistance, advocacy, and philanthropic investment in support of the school’s strategic objectives.
The Henry L. Hillman Foundation is re-upping its commitment to cultivate cancer research and care by committing an additional $30 million over the next 10 years to the University of Pittsburgh and the UPMC Hillman Cancer Center.
Some of our favorite HPM alumni connected at Clyde’s of Gallery Place on September 27, 2017. Back Row: Jenny Huang, Alexandra Dulin, Alex Nason, David Tye, Mark Faccenda, Kevin Broom, Mark Roberts; Front Row: Deborah Backman, Nikita Sharma, Sally Caine Leathers, Kelly Delmore, Kristin Lazzara, and Kush Banjeree.
A new handheld device could someday help cancer surgeons figure out what to cut and what to leave alone in real time. The MasSpecPen employs water, plastic tubing, and a mass spectrometer. It's the latest in engineer's effort to speed up the pace at which samples collected during operations are processed for clinically valuable information.
A radiation oncologist, and widow whose husband died of cancer, studies the effects of financial strain on cancer patients.