Carolina Public Health, Spring 2008, Leadership by UNC Gillings School of Global Public Health

SPRING 2008

Public Health Foundation, Incorporated Fred T. Brown, Jr., MPH, FACHE Foundation Board President Managing Director, Business Development Carolinas HealthCare System Susanne Glen Moulton, JD, MPH Foundation Board Vice President Director Patient Assistance and Reimbursement Programs GlaxoSmithKline Delton Atkinson, MPH, MPH, PMP Special Assistant for Re-engineering and Registration Methods Division of Vital Statistics National Center for Health Statistics Centers for Disease Control and Prevention Ronald E. Aubert, PhD, MSPH Vice President, Clinical Analytics, Outcomes and Reporting Medco Health Solutions, Incorporated David J. Ballard, MD, MSPH, PhD, FACP Senior Vice President and Chief Quality Officer Baylor Health Care System Executive Director and BHCS Endowed Chair Institute for Health Care Research and Improvement Kelly B. Browning, MA Executive Vice President American Institute for Cancer Research

Deniese M. Chaney, MPH Senior Manager, Healthcare Practice Accenture Health and Life Sciences Michael (Trey) A. Crabb, III, MHA, MBA Managing Director, Investment Banking Avondale Partners, LLC Leah Devlin, DDS, MPH State Health Director and Director, Division of Public Health N.C. Department of Health and Human Services David L. Dodson, MDiv (Honorary Member) President MDC, Incorporated Cynthia J. Girman, DrPH Senior Director, Department of Epidemiology Merck Research Laboratories Shelley D. Golden, MPH Lecturer Department of Health Behavior and Health Education UNC School of Public Health Sandra W. Green, MBA, MHA, BSPH President East Coast Customer Management Group MedAssets, Incorporated C. David Hardison, PhD Corporate Vice President, Life Sciences Science Applications International Corporation

2008 School of Public Health Dennis Gillings, CBE Advisory Council Chair Chairman and Chief Executive Officer Quintiles Transnational Corporation William K. Atkinson, PhD, MPH President and Chief Executive Officer WakeMed Joseph Carsanaro, MBA, MSEE General Manager Personal Communications Sector Motorola, Incorporated Willard Cates, Jr., MD, MPH President, Research Family Health International Andrew Conrad, PhD Chief Scientific Officer National Genetics Institute

B o a r d o f Dir e c t o rs

Deborah Parham Hopson, PhD, RN Assistant Surgeon General Associate Administrator, HIV/AIDS Bureau Health Resources and Services Administration

Jacky Ann Rosati, PhD Environmental Scientist and Containment Area Lead U.S. Environmental Protection Agency National Homeland Security Research Center

Joan C. Huntley, PhD, MPH Adjunct Professor of Epidemiology UNC School of Public Health

Ilene C. Siegler, PhD, MPH Professor of Medical Psychology Duke University

Lisa M. LaVange, PhD Professor and Director of the Collaborative Studies Coordinating Center Department of Biostatistics UNC School of Public Health

Paula Brown Stafford, MPH Executive Vice President Global Data Management and Biostatistics Quintiles Transnational Corporation

Mark H. Merrill, MSPH (Honorary Member) President Presbyterian Hospital of Dallas

Russell B. Toal, MPH Visiting Associate Professor of Public Health Institute of Public Health Georgia State University

Beverly N. Mirman, DPA, MPA, MSPH Pinehurst, NC

John C. Triplett, MD, MPH Regional Medical Officer Bethesda, MD

Douglas M. Owen, PE, BCEE Vice President Malcolm Pirnie, Incorporated

Robert D. Verhalen, DrPH Chief Executive Officer Verhalen and Associates, LLC

Jonathan J. Pullin, MS President and Chief Executive Officer The Environmental Group of the Carolinas, Incorporated

Jack E. Wilson, MSENV Retired Board of Directors TEC, Incorporated

Roy J. Ramthun, MSPH President HSA Consulting Services, LLC

Thomas K. Wong, PhD Vice President Meganium Corporation

A d vis o r y C o u n c il

Keith Crisco, MBA President Asheboro Elastics Corporation

J. Douglas Holladay, MDiv General Partner Park Avenue Equity Partners, LP

Carmen Hooker Odom, MS President Milbank Memorial Fund

Nancy A. Dreyer, PhD, MPH Chief of Scientific Affairs OUTCOME

Donald A. Holzworth, MS Senior Vice President Director, Global Health Sector SRA International, Incorporated

Jane Smith Patterson Executive Director The e-NC Authority

Ken Eudy Chief Executive Officer Capstrat Robert J. Greczyn, Jr., MPH President and Chief Executive Officer BlueCross and BlueShield of North Carolina James R. Hendricks, Jr., MS Vice President of Environment, Health and Safety (Retired) Duke Energy

David P. King President and Chief Executive Officer Laboratory Corporation of America A. Dennis McBride, MD, MPH Health Director City of Milford, Connecticut John McConnell Raleigh, NC Guy Miller, MD, PhD Chairman and Chief Executive Officer Edison Pharmaceuticals, Incorporated

Joan Siefert Rose, MPH General Manager North Carolina Public Radio-WUNC Charles A. Sanders, MD Chapel Hill, NC Michael C. Tarwater, MHA, FACHE President and Chief Executive Officer Carolinas HealthCare System Paul M. Wiles, MHA President and Chief Executive Officer Novant Health, Incorporated

contents spring 2008

e mourn the passing of three great campus leaders this year and dedicate this issue to them: Daniel A. Okun (1917-2007)

Eve Marie Carson (1985-2008)

Herman A. (Al) Tyroler (1924-2007)

features & news

4 Public Health Leaders

6 Leading the Way:

School programs create leadership opportunities

8 Relying on herself, looking out

for the children: Sarah Morrow

10 The day that changed North Carolina public health: Leah Devlin

12 Integrity with a capital I: Deborah Parham Hopson

14 Moulton pairs law, public health

expertise to influence health policy: Sandy Moulton 15 Competence and Charisma: P. LaMont Bryant 16 Creating a culture of collaboration: Raymond Greenberg 18 From puppies to people: Bob Weedon

20 To share the vision and touch the soul: Roland Edgar (Eddie) Mhlanga 22 Efficient, reliable injury data collection saves lives: Robert Verhalen 24 A recipe for leadership: Greg Allgood 26 Develop collaborative practices: Lillian Rivera 27 Building partnerships to stop disease: Victor C ceres 29 Epidemiologists provide compass for pharmaceutical research: Alice White

30 Transforming health through passionate leadership: Don Holzworth 32 Growing into Leadership: Nicole Bates

continued 8 c a r o l i n a p u b l i c h e a lt h

from the Dean’s desk

spring 2008

arren Bennis, internationally renowned leadership scholar, said that leadership is the capacity to transform vision into reality.

Dean

Barbara K. Rimer, DrPH Director of Communications

Ramona DuBose Editor

contents continued

Emily J. Smith Associate Dean for External Affairs

Peggy Dean Glenn Design and Production

33 School alum revolutionizes

42 Vice president at Amgen, Inc. says

study of occupational

connections made at Carolina

epidemiology: Aaron Blair

continue: George Williams

34 Putting teeth in public health:

43 When Ricketts talks, the N.C.

Lynn Mouden

General Assembly listens:

36 A way with water: Alfonso

Thomas Ricketts

Zavala

46 School News

38 Success is a team effort:

51 in memoriam: Dr. al tyroler,

Heather Munroe-Blum

dr. daniel okun and

40 Dare County health director

craig michalak remembered

identifies the win-win and

54 Awards & Recognitions:

works to that end: Anne Thomas

September 2007 – April 2008

41 Let’s change the question: What are your dreams? —

Karen Hibbert UNC Design Services Contributing Writers

Margarita De Pano, Paul Frellick, Bev Holt, Linda Kastleman, Kathleen Kearns, Anne Menkens, Prashant Nair, PhD, Gene Pinder and Angela Spivey

Dr. Barbara K. Rimer Articles appearing in Carolina Public Health may be reprinted with permission from the editor. Send correspondence to Editor, Carolina Public Health, UNC School of Public Health, Campus Box 7400, Chapel Hill, NC 27599-7400, or phone 919.966.8498 or send e-mail to emily_smith@unc.edu.

Fiorella Horna-Guerra

opportunities to invest 57 Celebrating friends who make

59 School exceeds Carolina

a World of Difference

First goal

58 $100,000 gift helps School create

60 GSK extends support for

Certificate in Global Health in

Pharmacoepidemiology Center

distance education format

59 UNC professor establishes new professorship for visiting faculty from developing countries

spring 2008

Subscribe to Carolina Public Health

www.sph.unc.edu/cph 22,000 copies of this document were printed at a cost of $19,839 or $0.90 per copy. Carolina Public Health is a publication of the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill School of Public Health.

That’s a tall order and even more challenging than it sounds. First, there has to be a vision, and then one has to transform reality. The first time I met Dennis Gillings, CEO of Quintiles Transnational Corp, it was obvious that he was a master at transforming vision into reality. Don Holzworth, former Constella CEO, has that ability. So do Leah Devlin (State Health Director and Director of the N.C. Division of Public Health), Carmen Hooker Odom (Former Secretary of the N.C. Department of Health and Human Services and now Milbank Memorial Fund President) and Bill Atkinson (CEO Wake Med). And they’re not alone. Leadership is a critical ingredient to improve health in the 21st century. Problems facing us are vast — huge disparities in the health of people across the U.S. and around the world, rising threats of infectious and chronic diseases, rising costs and plummeting resources, challenges of allocating new technologies so they benefit as many people as possible, and assuring that all people in the U.S. have access to health care. In today’s world, we need strong leadership more than ever before. While in the past, public health leaders may have focused primarily on the poor and disenfranchised, now we recognize that to achieve measurable improvements in community health, broader partnerships across sectors are needed — with religious organizations, businesses and a variety of non-government organizations. Public health must be broader, deeper and more inclusive. Strong leaders I have known, like Dan Amos, AFLAC CEO, and Dr. Richard Klausner, former head of the National Cancer Institute, recognize that they must bring many people to the table to achieve their goals. That may mean new voices, such as businesses working with government or community representatives and advocates joining scientists. Future public health leaders will require greater reach, more partners and new funding models. New partners won’t all look like us. They should represent the different domains needed to solve problems. Strong leaders have clear ethical codes that guide them. They are willing to take tough stands on difficult issues. Dr. Dan Okun (Environmental Sciences and Engineering professor and former chair), Dr. Lucy Morgan (Health Behavior and

Health Education professor and former chair) and UNC President Emeritus Bill Friday were exemplars in this regard, forever enlightening Chapel Hill through their personal and professional stands against segregation. I am proud of Carolina’s tradition in this regard. It also is critical that leaders remember that we are not our jobs and offices. My father interacted with a lot of celebrities in his job at the American Cancer Society, but he never got carried away with a sense of his own importance. I like the adage that our friends are the ones we had before we were directors, presidents and deans. And our dogs love us no matter what! Leadership benefits from perspective. Across our School, there are hundreds of examples of leadership — people who lead programs and departments, who see needs and act on them, who mobilize people, run organizations, and improve health. I point to three examples of leadership — demonstrated by students. Carolina for Kibera, an organization devoted to improving the lives of people living in one of the world’s worst slums, was started by Carolina students, including Kim Chapman Page, one of our own master’s of public health alumni. Carolina for Kibera is a remarkable organization that has received worldwide recognition. This year, the Minority Student Caucus mounted the 29th annual Minority Health Conference, with more than 620 people attending. Janelle ArmstrongBrown and Eboni Taylor led the effort with incredibly maturity. (Visit www.minority.unc.edu and see page 48.) Our Global Health Advisory Committee has mobilized people across the School and campus to focus on global health. In February 2008, they hosted the first global fashion show, raising more than $3,000 for Honduran Health Alliance. (Visit www.sph.unc.edu/ogh.) Leadership is a fundamental part of improving the public’s health. It is our imperative. I am so impressed by the leaders this School has helped develop. Please read about some of them in the pages that follow. Together, let us transform the vision of a healthier world into reality.

c a r o l i n a p u b l i c h e a lt h

from the Dean’s desk

spring 2008

arren Bennis, internationally renowned leadership scholar, said that leadership is the capacity to transform vision into reality.

Dean

Barbara K. Rimer, DrPH Director of Communications

Ramona DuBose Editor

contents continued

Emily J. Smith Associate Dean for External Affairs

Peggy Dean Glenn Design and Production

33 School alum revolutionizes

42 Vice president at Amgen, Inc. says

study of occupational

connections made at Carolina

epidemiology: Aaron Blair

continue: George Williams

34 Putting teeth in public health:

43 When Ricketts talks, the N.C.

Lynn Mouden

General Assembly listens:

36 A way with water: Alfonso

Thomas Ricketts

Zavala

46 School News

38 Success is a team effort:

51 in memoriam: Dr. al tyroler,

Heather Munroe-Blum

dr. daniel okun and

40 Dare County health director

craig michalak remembered

identifies the win-win and

54 Awards & Recognitions:

works to that end: Anne Thomas

September 2007 – April 2008

41 Let’s change the question: What are your dreams? —

Karen Hibbert UNC Design Services Contributing Writers

Margarita De Pano, Paul Frellick, Bev Holt, Linda Kastleman, Kathleen Kearns, Anne Menkens, Prashant Nair, PhD, Gene Pinder and Angela Spivey

Fiorella Horna-Guerra

opportunities to invest 57 Celebrating friends who make

59 School exceeds Carolina

a World of Difference

First goal

58 $100,000 gift helps School create

60 GSK extends support for

Certificate in Global Health in

Pharmacoepidemiology Center

distance education format

59 UNC professor establishes new professorship for visiting faculty from developing countries

spring 2008

Subscribe to Carolina Public Health

c a r o l i n a p u b l i c h e a lt h

features & news

p u b l i c h e a lt h l e a d e r s

Public Health Leaders Setting the

goals

Setting the

pace

Setting the

example 4

spring 2008

fundamental strategy by which Carolina’s School of Public Health creates sustainable, positive changes in public health is by educating the next generation of public health leaders. When it was suggested that we devote an issue of Carolina Public Health magazine to “leadership,” we were enthusiastic. Then came the first challenge — how to define “leadership” for the issue. The spectrum of possibilities seemed endless. We looked at programs at our School with “leadership” in their names — Public Health Leadership Program, Executive Doctoral Program in Health Leadership, Emerging Leaders in Public Health…. These are all wonderful programs that have produced or enhanced the careers of many of our public health leaders. But every department and every program at our School has “developing leadership” as a principal foundation of its very existence. We train

leaders. So we asked each department in the School to nominate graduates who have become outstanding leaders. The response was astronomical. We were inundated with fabulous examples of “public health leaders” at different levels, disciplines and career stages. We didn’t have room in one magazine to cover them all. So, taking a deep breath, an editorial board of School representatives selected the people profiled here. This sample of profiles is not intended, by any means, to be a complete or definitive list. Leadership profiles will be a regular feature in the magazine. Please send us suggestions!

The work of our graduates and faculty is inspiring, indeed. By communicating their stories of leadership, we want to share “best practices” and provide opportunities for others in the field to make connections.

What makes a leader? John Quincy Adams once said, “If your actions inspire others to dream more, learn more, do more and become more, you are a leader.” As we began our profiles for this issue, certain ideas kept resurfacing: make sustainable changes; create vision and inspire people; help people help themselves; build bridges; listen to people, then listen some more; compromise; negotiate…. Here’s more of what our alumni shared about leadership: Dr. Deborah Parham Hopson, assistant surgeon general and rear admiral in the Commissioned Corps of the U.S. Public Health Service, holds a monthly “Chat and Chew” luncheon to listen to employees of the HIV/AIDS bureau she oversees. “If you’re a leader, you listen to employees and try to treat them like they want to be treated,” she says. (See page 12.) A colleague says that Dare County Health Director Anne Thomas “communicates honestly and directly what others are afraid to say, and she is heard because she seeks to understand and solve, not judge or blame.” (See page 40.) Water specialist Greg Allgood learned from his mentor and boss, Procter & Gamble CEO John Pepper, that, “To be a great leader, you have to be willing to serve.” (See page 24.)

Leadership starts with vision One of the foremost leaders associated with our School is former biostatistics professor Dr. Dennis Gillings, chairman and chief executive officer of Quintiles Transnational Corp. and chair of the School’s Advisory Council. Gillings, CBE (Commander of the British Empire), and his wife, Joan, pledged $50 million to our School in 2007. This Septem-

ber, we become the UNC Gillings School of Global Public Health. Neither Dennis nor Joan are profiled in this issue, because we plan stories on them in the fall issue of the magazine. But we would miss a great

all to embrace — this is the most important thing I learned from Dennis Gillings. It’s not good enough to have vision — you must be able to communicate it and get agreement and buy-in from all for a shared goal. Or as

If your actions inspire others to dream more, learn more, do more and become more, you are a leader. opportunity if we didn’t highlight Dennis’ leadership example here. Dr. Bill Sollecito, director of the School’s Public Health Leadership Program since 1997, says he learned important leadership qualities from Gillings. Sollecito was a biostatistics student of Gillings while earning his DrPH at the School. Later, from 1982 to 1996, he worked for Gillings at Quintiles, ultimately as president of Quintiles Americas, where he was responsible for clinical operations in Canada, South America and the United States. “Leadership starts with a vision, a view of where your organization should go,” Sollecito says. “All great leaders have the ability to envision the future and set out a path for

W. Edwards Deming describes it, there must be ‘constancy of purpose’ in the organization to achieve vision.” Sollecito says he learned another important characteristic of leadership from Gillings — both in his classroom and as part of his leadership team. “One of the ways you empower people is to train new leaders. This is especially true in a university where our faculty are leaders and mentors of other leaders at every interface — through the classroom to the lab and most importantly, through everyday interactions. That is how I learned leadership from Dennis Gillings. The key is interchange of ideas — not top down, but through exchange, debate and collaborative learning.” 8

encourage negotiate

inspire

dream communicate collaborate empower listen

envision

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Public Health Leaders Setting the

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Setting the

pace

Setting the

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encourage negotiate

inspire

dream communicate collaborate empower listen

envision

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features & news

p u b l i c h e a lt h l e a d e r s

Training leaders “If I have seen farther than others, it is by standing on the shoulders of giants,” said Sir Isaac Newton. Many of the inspiring public health leaders profiled in this issue laud the professors who coached, coaxed and challenged them through their coursework and into their careers. Professors like the late Al Tyroler, who helped students like Robert Verhalen carve new fields of study. (See page 22.) And professors like John Hatch, who taught students like Fiorella Horna-Guerra, “Don’t just ask people what they need. Let’s change the question. Ask them what their dreams are.” (See page 41.) Within the next four years, more than 250,000 additional public health workers will be needed in the United States to avert a public health crisis, according to an assessment released this spring by the Association of Schools of Public Health (see www.asph.org/ shortage). This startling statistic makes our work training leaders even more important.

challenge

motivate

inﬂuence

“We know that there will always be a shortage of well-trained and highly effective leaders in public health nationally and throughout the world,” says Dr. Edward Baker, director of the North Carolina Institute for Public Health, the School’s service arm. “We know that many top leaders are nearing retirement, and limited attention has been paid to organized approaches to developing the leaders of the future through well-resourced succession planning and career development programs. Our School is uniquely positioned to replenish the diminishing ranks of public health leadership in North Carolina, the U.S. and the world in light of our strong record of tailoring our programs to meet the needs of the health field.” 8

Leading the Way School programs focus on creating leadership opportunities for working public health professionals

hile every academic program at our School embraces leadership development as a principal foundation, several special programs provide specific opportunities for leadership growth. Some offer distance education opportunities for working public health professionals. Others prepare mid-career professionals for senior-level positions. Below are highlights of some of these programs. Executive Doctoral Program in Health Leadership (DrPH Program): UNC’s Doctoral Program in Health Leadership — the world’s first distance DrPH program — prepares mid-career professionals for senior-level positions in organizations working domestically and internationally to improve the public’s health. The threeyear, cohort-based distance program targets individuals working full-time with substantial leadership responsibilities in communities, organizations and institutions. With the exception of three short visits to Chapel Hill in each of years one and two, learning takes place in participants’ homes and offices, away from the UNC campus. Students connect to faculty and peers mainly via computer, making substantial use of technology that allows students and faculty to share data and interact productively via live video and audio. The distance

format allows working professionals to complete doctoral leadership training while continuing full-time employment, remaining in-country throughout the duration of their education. For more information, visit www.sph.unc.edu/ hpaa/executive_drph. Executive Master’s Programs: The UNC School of Public Health’s Executive Master’s Programs are consistently ranked among the top in the country. The School’s Executive Master of Healthcare Administration (MHA) is aimed at working, mid-career professionals seeking senior executive positions in health care while the Executive Master of Public Health (MPH) is geared toward working professionals pursuing top-level executive positions in public health. The curriculum for both programs emphasizes public health, financial management, general

management, and analysis and systems, and culminates in the development and presentation of an integrated business plan. Both programs are part of the School’s Department of Health Policy and Administration. For more information, visit www.sph.unc.edu/hpaa/executive_ masters_programs.html. Emerging Leaders in Public Health (ELPH): This collaboration of the UNC School of Public Health’s North Carolina Institute for Public Health and the UNC Kenan-Flagler Business School provides leadership and management training to minority health professionals. Participants are selected for an intensive nine-month program focused on managing in times of crisis. Because racial and ethnic health disparities are best addressed when communities identify with policy- and decision-makers, the program seeks to strengthen the outreach capability of health systems by preparing leaders who can work with diverse communities. The program is funded by the W.K. Kellogg Foundation. For more information, visit www.publichealthleaders.org. Public Health Leadership Program (PHLP): The Public Health Leadership Program prepares public health practitioners to assume greater leadership responsibilities and, in particular, to meet leadership challenges wherever they occur throughout the world. Through certificates and graduate degrees offered in both residential and distance learning formats, the program brings an interdisciplinary approach to the development of population-level knowledge and skills. PHLP offers a Public Health Leadership Certificate, an Occupational Health Nursing certificate, a Master of Public Health degree in three concentration areas and a Master of Science degree in public health/occupational health nursing. For more information, visit www.sph.unc. edu/phlp.

Southeast Public Health Leadership Institute (SEPHLI): SEPHLI is a year-long leadership development program for midto senior-level public health administrators working in North Carolina, Arkansas, South Carolina, Tennessee, Virginia or West Virginia. The Institute supports the strengthening of leadership competencies, such as creating a shared vision, personal awareness, systems thinking, risk communication, team building, ethical decision making and political and social change strategies. Scholars interact with local and national leaders during retreats, phone conferences and online computer discussion forums. The program is part of the North Carolina Institute for Public Health. For more information, visit www.sephli.org. Management Academy for Public Health (MAPH): MAPH is a nine-month executive education course customized for health managers in the public health system. Teams learn skills in managing people, money, data and partners. To practice their skills and improve their organizations, MAPH students work in teams to develop a business plan. Courses are taught by faculty from the UNC School of Public Health and the Kenan-Flagler Business School. The program is administered through the North Carolina Institute for Public Health. For more information, visit www.maph.unc.edu. National Public Health Leadership Institute: The institute focuses on strengthening the leadership competencies of senior-level decision makers who lead major public or private health organizations. Faculty and staff engage leaders in teams from around the United States in individual and organization change efforts. The institute strives to assure that officials efficiently and effectively respond to challenges in the twenty-first century. The program is based at the North Carolina Institute for Public Health — the service arm of the UNC School of Public Health —

in partnership with the Center for Health Leadership and Practice, a center of the Public Health Institute in Oakland Calif., and the Center for Creative Leadership in Greensboro N.C. For more information, visit www.phli.org. Management and Supervision for Public Health Nurse Supervisors and Directors: This three-week course, begun in 1961, provides leadership growth opportunities for nurses — the largest group of public health workers in North Carolina. The event is held at GlaxoSmithKline in Research Triangle Park, N.C. Course faculty include representatives from the UNC School of Public Health’s Office of Continuing Education; UNC-Chapel Hill School of Government; North Carolina Department of Health and Human Services’ Office of Public Health Nursing and Professional Development; and local public health leaders and private consultants. For more information, visit www.sph.unc.edu/oce/ nurse_managers.html. FAST TRACK Leadership Development Program: FAST TRACK Leadership is a three-and-a-half day intensive leadership development program that focuses on leadership and management skills for individuals from a variety of backgrounds, including public health, academia, government and business. The program is designed to significantly expand self awareness and quickly build practical skills for effectively leading and managing people. Facilitated by faculty from the UNC School of Public Health, the program teaches how to create the kind of organizational culture that engages and motivates employees. Six of the most respected psychological assessment tools form the foundation of the program. Personalized executive coaching and expert facilitation guide each participant’s individual development plan. For more information, visit www.FastTrackLeadership.org.

continued on page 44

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Leading the Way School programs focus on creating leadership opportunities for working public health professionals

continued on page 44

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P u b l i c H e a lt h L e a d e r s : S a r a h M o r r o w

photo b y K athl e e n K e a r ns

for the children

Dr. Sarah Morrow

hen Sarah Morrow (then Sarah Taylor) was five years old, she went with her physician father to see a premature baby he had delivered. When the mother came out holding the tiny infant in one hand, the little girl thought, “That’s what I want to do, take care of babies.”

She fulfilled that intention many times over, as a pediatrician, as a mother who raised six children by herself, and especially as a pioneering public health leader. At the Guilford County Department of Public Health from

spring 2008

1960 through 1976, and then as secretary of North Carolina’s Department of Human Resources until 1984, Sarah Morrow made reducing the child mortality rate one of her top priorities.

“She had one of the first, if not the first, very large scale programs for dealing with children who did not have adequate access to care,” says Dr. Ron Levine, who was with the state health department when Morrow established the Child and Youth Program in Guilford County. “It was the early days of Medicaid, and the financing was available but the services were not there. She took the rather bold step of saying, ‘We’re a provider. While our focus is on good health and the prevention of disease, it’s appropriate when all else fails to become intimately involved with services.’ She got a huge grant from the federal government to provide everything that a child on the private side could expect from their pediatrician — immunizations, preschool screening, the whole spectrum of care.” Because of this and other innovations, the Guilford County health department under Morrow’s direction was regarded as one of the best in the nation. Still, she was surprised when then-Governor James B. Hunt Jr., asked her to join his cabinet as secretary of what is now the Department of Health and Human Services. In fact, at first she said no. She’d have to take a salary cut, and she still had one son living at home in Greensboro. Hunt asked again, and she declined again. Then he asked a third time. This time Morrow accepted, and became the first woman to lead the department, just as she’d been Guilford County’s first woman health director. She took the challenge in stride, having long depended on herself both personally and professionally. She had become a doctor at the ripe old age of 23, her

training hastened along because there was a war on. She earned her Bachelor of Science in medicine at UNC in 1942 and graduated from the University of Maryland’s medical school two years later. “The schooling and conditioning that makes a good doctor gives a sense of independence and security and confidence in oneself,” she says. She would need that confidence in the personal challenges ahead. She married a medical school classmate and

“When you have six children, all with different personalities, you learn to compromise and negotiate,” she says. “I think that is one of the essentials in leadership. When you deal with people who have different ideas than you do, it’s so important to be able to see their side and be able to compromise and negotiate.” By the time she joined Hunt’s cabinet, that ability was second nature. “It was always a challenge to determine where (resources were) most badly needed,” she says. “I had to

When you deal with people who have different ideas than you do, it’s so important to be able to see their side and be able to compromise and negotiate. eventually moved with him to South Carolina. When he was called back to the Navy during the Korean War, she took a job leading the Chester, S.C., health department. She had four children by then and was expecting another. “While he was gone, I ran the health department, built a house and had a baby,” she says. When her husband came back, they had another child. By then it became clear he had mental health problems so severe that she would have to be the sole breadwinner. In 1959, she came to Chapel Hill to complete a master’s degree at the UNC School of Public Health and refresh her pediatric skills. Her husband by then required residential psychiatric care. With the help of the family’s longtime housekeeper, Morrow raised her children while taking increasing responsibility as a public health leader. She used some of the same skills in both roles.

work that out with our General Assembly. The representatives were looking out for the needs of their own counties, and you had to balance that against the needs of the whole state.” Access to health care for North Carolina’s infants and children improved dramatically

during Morrow’s years as secretary, and decades later there is abundant evidence of her personal and professional impact on public health in the state. Morrow retired in 2005 at the age of 84 after twenty years as medical director for Electronic Data Systems. She remains an active volunteer for North Carolina Citizens for Public Health, a nonprofit organization dedicated to promoting citizen involvement in public health issues. Several of her children went on to their own careers in public health. Son John earned a master’s in nutrition from Carolina’s School of Public Health in 1983 and is now director of the Pitt County (N.C.) Health Department. Daughter Lynne Perrin recently retired from the Division of Medical Assistance in the N.C. Department of Health and Human Services and now consults with a hospital in Charlotte, N.C. Another son, Paul, works in the administrative side of public health as a budget officer with the N.C. Department of Health and Human Services. And one of Morrow’s thirteen grandchildren, Sarah Lacy Dean, 21, now lives with “Granny Doc” while she pursues a pre-med curriculum at Carolina. n – B y K a thl e e n K e a r ns

photo b y K athl e e n K e a r ns

Relying on herself, Looking Out

Dr. Sarah Morrow served as secretary of what is now North Carolina’s Department of Health and Human Services from 1976 through 1984. She was the first woman to lead the department. Morrow (right) points to a photo of her 1942 University of Maryland medical school class. She earned a master’s of public health from Carolina’s School of Public Health in 1959. c a r o l i n a p u b l i c h e a lt h

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P u b l i c H e a lt h L e a d e r s : S a r a h M o r r o w

photo b y K athl e e n K e a r ns

for the children

Dr. Sarah Morrow

spring 2008

1960 through 1976, and then as secretary of North Carolina’s Department of Human Resources until 1984, Sarah Morrow made reducing the child mortality rate one of her top priorities.

photo b y K athl e e n K e a r ns

Relying on herself, Looking Out

features & news

The

day that changed North Carolina

photo b y K athl e e n K e a r ns

P UBLIC H EALT H LEADERS : LEA H DEVLIN

public health

t was October 4, 2001, and State Health Director Leah M. Devlin and other officials were in a homeland security meeting. The FBI agent assigned to North Carolina left the room to take a phone call. During the next break, he took Devlin and the head of the State Bureau of Investigation (SBI) aside. “I just want to let you know that we have — ” he began. “Pulmonary anthrax,” Devlin finished for him. The CDC had already notified her that a Florida man being treated for the rare, deadly disease had been traveling in North Carolina just before he became ill. Though the source of the man’s disease would later be traced to anthrax spores sent through the postal system to his Florida office, no one knew that then. Likewise, no one knew — though many feared — that his illness signaled a bioterrorist attack. “That was the day public health in North Carolina changed forever,” Devlin says. “We started right then with a massive investigation, trying to determine the source of his exposure and whether anybody else was sick.” Devlin led an effort involving 19 hospitals, multiple counties and thousands of medical

spring 2008

records. It called on the expertise of microbiologists, epidemiologists, medical examiners, veterinarians and many other specialists, including law enforcement agents. “The fact that Public Health knew about this before the FBI gave us instant credibil-

and the public that health departments play a critical role in defending against bioterrorism and other threats. It also served as a fire drill for the agencies themselves. Under Devlin’s leadership, her team analyzed what worked well and what didn’t and put plans in place to ensure that the departments would respond to future incidents — like the subsequent West Nile virus outbreak — even more efficiently and effectively. They also built on something that started that October day, what Devlin calls a “fabulous partnership with law enforcement.” As a result, North Carolina now stands as a national model of preparedness for public health emergencies, whether bioterrorism, emerging infectious disease or natural disaster. The accomplishment is particularly striking in light of the fact that when Devlin

She is extremely well respected across the country as well as in Congress and in the [Federal] administration. ity and made us worthy of collaboration,” Devlin says. “We had the FBI and SBI on every conference call we had. They were participating in public health work even as they did their own investigations.” The incident demonstrated to legislators

was confronted with the anthrax case, she had been directing the state health department for only a few months. Devlin says she didn’t even know what a health department was until she was a junior in UNC’s School of Dentistry and did

Dr. Leah Devlin

a rotation with the Wake County Health Department through the N.C. Area Health Education Centers Program (AHEC). Once she graduated, she went to work for the county as a dentist and later moved into dental public health administration there. By the time she was asked to serve as the county’s acting health director, a position that later became permanent, she had earned her master’s in public health, one of the first completed through the UNC School of Public Health’s distance learning program. After ten years as Wake County health director, she moved to the state Division of Public Health as deputy director; five years later, Under the leadership of State Health Director Leah Devlin, North Carolina became the first — and so far the only — state to mandate accreditation for local health departments and so make quality and capacity consistent across the state. Devlin earned a master’s in public health administration from the UNC School of Public Health and a doctor of dental surgery from the UNC Dental School.

she began serving as state health director and director of the Division. “She is extremely well respected across the country as well as in Congress and in the [Federal] administration,” says Dr. Paul E. Jarris, executive director of the Association of State and Territorial Health Officers, an organization for which Devlin recently served as president. “When a national group or think tank is being put together, people often want Leah.” On Devlin’s watch, North Carolina also became the first — and so far the only — state to mandate accreditation for local health departments and so make quality and capacity consistent across the state. Her department works closely with the School’s North Carolina Institute for Public Health, which is the state accreditation administrator. “There is now a national movement to do this in the rest of the country,” says Dr. Ron Levine, himself a former state health director and a longtime mentor. “She is clearly the

lead person on that.” Devlin is such a successful leader, Levine says, because she has the ability to bring together diverse interests. Jarris credits her quick grasp of complex issues and her ability to be at once very pleasant and extremely direct. In a meeting with federal Secretary of Health and Human Services Mike Leavitt, for instance, Devlin commented that something was “just nonsense.” “He stopped, looked at her and wanted to talk with her because people in his position rarely hear that,” Jarris says. “She has a wonderful ability to say those things in a nice way.” Devlin credits her colleagues in North Carolina’s Division of Public Health for the state’s national reputation as an innovator in public health. “If I have a strength, it’s being able to find good people to work with,” she says. “That’s my biggest strength.” n – B y K a thl e e n K e a r ns c a r o l i n a p u b l i c h e a lt h

features & news

The

day that changed North Carolina

photo b y K athl e e n K e a r ns

P UBLIC H EALT H LEADERS : LEA H DEVLIN

public health

spring 2008

Dr. Leah Devlin

features & news

Integrity with a capital I A

t the U.S. Health Resources and Services Administration, Dr. Deborah Parham Hopson, associate administrator for the HIV/ AIDS Bureau, is responsible for a $2 billion program with more than 100 employees that is very much in the public eye. But every month, she sits

down for a lunchtime “Chat and Chew,” where employees of the HIV/AIDS bureau — from secretaries to program officers to branch directors — can join her and share their concerns. “It’s just an opportunity for my staff to get unfiltered information from the horse’s mouth. This is a structured way to keep a direct line of communication open,” says Parham Hopson, who earned her master’s and doctoral degrees in health policy and administration from the UNC School of Public Health. The practice is characteristic of Parham Hopson’s concern for her staff, says Idalia Sanchez, who once reported indirectly to Parham Hopson and is now senior policy advisor for the National Center on Minority Health and Health Disparities. “You may not have all the things you need in terms of resources, but if you know that you have Dr. Parham Hopson’s ear and her support, it makes a big difference,” Sanchez says. Providing that support is part of Parham Hopson’s definition of leadership. “If you’re a leader, you listen to employees and try to

spring 2008

treat them like they want to be treated. You have to listen to them to find out what makes them tick and what makes them want to produce and to work for you,” she says. The approach has worked for Parham Hopson who rose to the rank of assistant surgeon general and rear admiral in the Commissioned Corps of the U.S. Public Health Service, making her the highest rank-

Dr. Deborah Parham Hopson

nurses were expected to work for at least a year in a hospital before going into public health. At age 21, a year seemed like a long time to her, so she decided to get into the field through a master’s degree. Accepted at two schools, she almost went to the one closer to her Ohio home until she visited Carolina and decided it was for her. “It was one of the best decisions I ever made,” she says. Even at that point in her career, Parham Hopson knew she was good at leading people and programs. “When I was first working on my master’s in public health, I thought I wanted to run a health center,

You have to pick your route. When you don’t know which way to step, just do what’s right. ing African-American woman in the Corps. She’s also the first African-American nurse to rise to that rank. Those are no small feats in an organization in which promotions are based on a yearly review of accomplishments, and physicians often retire as captains. Parham Hopson is a registered nurse whose clinical experience is in neonatal intensive care nursing. It was during a rotation in nursing school that she discovered her excitement for public health. In those days,

a little community clinic somewhere,” she says. Then, for her required field training for her master’s degree, she spent a summer in Washington as a White House intern. “I was there working in the White House in the Office of the Special Assistant to the President on Health Affairs. That gave me an inkling of health policy at a very high level. I realized I could help make the policies for all the clinics and have a bigger impact, and I liked that,” she says.

Dr. Deborah Parham Hopson (far right) pauses for a photo with her Tanzanian counterparts during an April 2007 trip to Tanzania as part of the Council of Women World Leaders Ministerial Fellows Program. Left to right: HRSA Administrator Dr. Betty Duke; Sarah Parker of the Council of Women World Leaders; Mwantumu Mahiza; Joyce Mapunjo; and Parham Hopson. Parham Hopson earned her master’s and doctoral degrees from Carolina. She is assistant surgeon general and rear admiral in the Commissioned Corps of the U.S. Public Health Service, making her the highest ranking African-American in the Corps.

After earning her master’s, Parham Hopson served as a presidential management intern, during which she got her first experience with the U.S. Public Health Service, working in the Bureau of Community Health Services, placing nurses in underserved areas. A few years later, she worked her way back to the Commissioned Corps of the Public Health Service, serving in several positions, including chief nurse. “I was responsible for nurses and nurse practitioners. When they ran into clinical issues out in the field, I would work with them to help them resolve those issues,” she says. In her current position, she’s responsible for managing the Ryan White HIV/AIDS Program, which funds medical care, treatment, referrals and support services for uninsured and underserved people living with HIV as well as training for health care professionals. And, as part of the President’s Emergency Plan for AIDS Relief, she directs a multi-million dollar global HIV/AIDS program with training, care and treatment activities in Africa, Asia and the Caribbean. Parham Hopson has worked on the policy side of the HIV and AIDs epidemic since 1994. Her introduction to the disease came in the early 1990s, when she worked on a project of the Coalition of 100 Black Women, a volunteer service organization. The organization raised money for Grandma’s House, a home for babies that had been born to mothers living with AIDS. “That was in the early 90s, when people didn’t quite know how HIV was transmitted, and didn’t know whether you might catch AIDS by holding and loving these children,” Parham Hopson says. Just before that experience, she had worked on her PhD at Carolina, where

P hoto cou r t e s y of U . S . H e a lth R e sou r c e s a nd S e r v i c e s Ad m i n i st r at i on

P hoto cou r t e s y of O ff i c e of H I V / AI D S P ol i c y, U . S . D e pa r t m e nt of H e a lth a nd H u m a n S e r v i c e s

p u b l i c h e a lt h l e a d e r s : d e b o r a h pa r h a m h o p s o n

discussions centered around HIV/AIDS as a major epidemic. “But when I started working with babies, it became more than an intellectual discussion. These were real people living and dying with AIDS,” she says. Because the Ryan White program was written into law by Congress, Parham Hopson’s job involves managing not only money and people, but also expectations. “Explaining to people why we’re managing the program the way we’re managing it is as critical a part of the job as handing out medications to people with HIV, because without the congressional support there would be no money for those programs,” she says. But Parham Hopson loves this tough job that at times can be a political minefield. “You have to pick your route,” she says. “When you don’t know

which way to step, just do what’s right.” Parham Hopson’s genuine sense of caring can be a rarity in Washington, says Dr. Joseph O’Neill, who supervised Parham Hopson when he was director of the U.S. Health Resources and Services Administration’s HIV-AIDS Bureau and she was his deputy. “The word that comes to mind is integrity with a capital I,” O’Neill says. “That is not something you find every day in Washington, particularly at the high policy level at which she lives. She’s got a very high level of personal ethics. You don’t get anywhere in the political life without having people disagree with you. But I dare say even people who disagree with her on substantive policy issues would never question her integrity or motivation.” n — B y Ang e l a S p i v e y c a r o l i n a p u b l i c h e a lt h

features & news

Integrity with a capital I A

spring 2008

Dr. Deborah Parham Hopson

P hoto cou r t e s y of U . S . H e a lth R e sou r c e s a nd S e r v i c e s Ad m i n i st r at i on

P hoto cou r t e s y of O ff i c e of H I V / AI D S P ol i c y, U . S . D e pa r t m e nt of H e a lth a nd H u m a n S e r v i c e s

p u b l i c h e a lt h l e a d e r s : d e b o r a h pa r h a m h o p s o n

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P UBLIC h e a l t h l e a d e r s : l a m o n t b r y a n t

Moulton pairs law, public health expertise

Competence and Charisma

to influence health policy S

M oulton h as gr aced the pages of dozens of publications , including The N ew Yor k Times , Washington P ost, N ewsw eek , R e a der' s D igest a nd S ou ther n L i v ing . a ndy

spring 2008

Foote-Hudson, director of what is now the GlaxoSmithKline Foundation of North Carolina, started the “Glaxo Child Health Recognition Awards.” These honors have been presented annually since 1994 to local health departments, staff members and individuals in the community who have developed innovative programs to address some aspect of child health. The idea was to identify and share best practices. Moulton has been leading GSK’s patient assistance programs for more than 10 years. She also is on the UNC School of Public Health Foundation Board, is a mentor in the School and, with husband Dr. Thomas Wong, is a scholarship donor and funder of renovations to a Rosenau Hall office. “Many people at this school have encouraged me throughout my career,” she says. “It’s wonderful to have opportunities to give back.” n – B y R a m on a D u B os e

Sandy Moulton, executive director of GSK’s Patient Access Programs Foundation, started her public health career at the N.C. Department of Human Services. One of her first projects was helping expand the state’s rabies vaccination requirements to include cats. After the bill passed, she remembers a legislator thanking her on behalf of his grandchildren, who adored kittens. Moulton earned a master’s in public health from UNC and is vice president of the Public Health Foundation Board at the School.

P. L a M ont B rya nt lik es m a k ing a n impact on people ’s li v es . F rom dominating the field as ca pta in of the footba ll te a m at N.C. C entr a l U ni v ersit y, to conducting grou nd br e a k ing r ese a rch as a gr a duate student wor k ing at the U.S. E n v ironmenta l P rotection A gency, to being the r enow ned public he a lth professiona l he is today, B rya nt is a le a der , dis pensing solutions a nd inspir ation a long the way.

photos b y r a m on a dubos e

She’s not showing off the latest fashion designs — she’s telling people how to get life-saving medicines. As executive director of the Patient Access Programs Foundation for pharmaceutical giant GlaxoSmithKline (GSK), she is in charge of programs that give away more than $1 million worth of GSK drugs daily to uninsured, low-income patients. GSK has run ads, featuring Sandy, to let people know about the programs. “I have the greatest job in the company,” she says. Moulton was one of the first UNC School of Public Health students with a law degree. In the 1970s, many women lawyers struggled to reach partner — or even get jobs — in private law firms, so Moulton took a different tack. “With so much emphasis on health policy, the combination of law and public health degrees is common now,” she says, “but when we started (she and two law school classmates), it was quite unusual.” As a staff attorney in the N.C. Department of Human Resources in the 1980s, she influenced the future of the state’s health care policy by re-codifying public health laws that hadn’t been revisited for half a century or more. In 1989, she went to work for Glaxo Inc. (now GlaxoSmithKline). The company had just pledged $5 million over five years to help the state fight infant mortality. As part of that program, Moulton and Marilyn

P hoto cou r t e s y of A r m y C oop

features & news

He chose to focus on pubic health, he says, because that’s where he felt he could make the biggest difference. “If you really think about what drives us all, it’s not our fact sheet or our budget sheet but our overall health,” says Bryant, who got his PhD in environmental sciences and engineering at Carolina’s School of Public Health in 2000. “Once you’ve lost your health, you’ve lost it. It’s our most precious semi-renewable resource, and I want to help manage it.” Today, Bryant is manager of regulatory affairs at Ethicon Endo-Surgery, Inc., a Johnson & Johnson company that develops and markets advanced medical devices for minimally invasive and open surgical procedures. Before that, he held several global leadership positions at Procter & Gamble (P&G), where he received many leadership awards, including the Rising Star Award for business contributions in 2005 and a Power of You Recognition Award for “building the organization” in 2007. Dr. Ron Webb, retired manager of doctoral recruiting and university relations at P&G, says Bryant’s tremendous presence attracts people and makes him a natural

leader. “He draws you in with his smile and strength — being a body builder helps! — allowing you to comfortably take his lead,” says Webb, who recruited Bryant to P&G in 2000. “He’s also willing to delegate work, to mentor and train others. To me what he does — taking on the responsibility of a leader while at the same time nurturing others — is the key aspect of outstanding leadership.”

Dr. P. LaMont Bryant

Carolina and the breadth of courses he took as a graduate student. He says that having a doctoral degree from a highly regarded environmental sciences and engineering program helped him secure key leadership positions in some of the most influential health care companies in the world, but adds that it was his actual experience within the doctoral program that enabled him to excel in his career. “Interacting with top-level students and professors from various countries who came to Chapel Hill for a common goal, engaging in open dialogue with them, and generally just being part of an environment that comes up with solutions and fosters growth…there

Being around excellent people constantly inspires you to be excellent in all things at all times. Webb adds that aside from being an outstanding team player who easily motivates people, Bryant is an excellent manager. “LaMont can quickly assess a problem, break it down into multiple work components, then make timely and concrete business decisions,” says Webb. Bryant, who’s managed some of the largest consumer health care brands in the world, credits much of his success to the intellectual and collaborative learning environment at

are tons of ways UNC helped me build on skill sets I possess,” says Bryant. “Being around excellent people constantly inspires you to be excellent in all things at all times.” n — B y M a r g a r i t a D e P a no Dr. P. LaMont Bryant is manager of regulatory affairs at Ethicon Endo-Surgery, Inc., a Johnson & Johnson company that develops and markets advanced medical devices for minimally invasive and open surgical procedures. He earned his PhD in environmental sciences and engineering from Carolina in 2000. c a r o l i n a p u b l i c h e a lt h

p u b l i c h e a lt h l e a d e r s : s a n dy m o u lt o n

P UBLIC h e a l t h l e a d e r s : l a m o n t b r y a n t

Moulton pairs law, public health expertise

Competence and Charisma

to influence health policy S

M oulton h as gr aced the pages of dozens of publications , including The N ew Yor k Times , Washington P ost, N ewsw eek , R e a der' s D igest a nd S ou ther n L i v ing . a ndy

spring 2008

photos b y r a m on a dubos e

P hoto cou r t e s y of A r m y C oop

features & news

Dr. P. LaMont Bryant

features & news

p u b l i c h e a lt h l e a d e r s : r ay m o n d g r e e n b e r g

Dr. Raymond Greenberg at Emory University.

“‘H

ealth care leadership’ is a wonderful oxymoron,” Dr. Raymond S. Greenberg said — with characteristic wryness — to a group of civil engineers last year. “With the possible exception of higher education, there is no human activity more naturally resistant to leadership than the ... American health care system.” A reality show based on the lives of those who work in health care, he suggested, could be called Hospital Fear Factor. Unexpected words, perhaps, from a man who was the founding dean of the Rollins School of Public Health at Emory University and is now president of the Medical University of South Carolina (MUSC). But

spring 2008

Ray Greenberg’s self-effacing humor has helped him become an innovative health care leader, one who successfully brought together even health care professionals who were initially resistant to the idea.

“Ray clearly understands that the work we do is very consequential work, but he certainly doesn’t take himself too seriously,” says MUSC faculty member Dr. Larry Mohr, who met Greenberg when both were undergraduates in Carolina’s chemistry department. “He’s able to put his life and his leadership in a very human perspective. It’s one of the reasons he’s been so effective.” In seven years as MUSC’s president, Greenberg has built a long list of achievements, including helping the school recover from the serious financial difficulties he inherited from the previous administration. Not only did he put the school “back in the black” in just one year, he has gone on to oversee the construction of cutting-edge patient and educational facilities. But he’s proudest of the collaborations he has fostered. One of those is merging the schools of pharmacy at MUSC and the University of

South Carolina into a single institution with campuses at each university. Think about that for a moment — two rival schools within the same system, each with its own administration, faculty and students, each with its own strengths and its own culture. “People focus on change, on what will be lost, not on what will be gained,” Greenberg says. “There was a lot of concern about losing identity, tradition, control.” He believed that merging the two schools would result in a whole greater than the sum of its parts, an institution that ultimately would become a top-tier pharmacy school. He and MUSC’s provost conveyed this vision through a series of town hall meetings with students, faculty and alumni groups. But, he says, it takes more than words to win hearts and minds. “The actions you follow up with have to convince people. They have to see that what you’re articulating and the reasons you’re doing it make sense, and that you’re serious about moving ahead with it.” Merging the pharmacy schools, Mohr says, was “a very innovative, very creative solution to focusing resources, eliminating duplication and providing new opportunities for educational and research collaboration.” The result, in his view, is a model for inter-institutional collaboration that could very well be replicated around the country. Under Greenberg’s leadership, MUSC also created the South Carolina Bioengineering Alliance with Clemson University. But his most striking success is Health Sciences South Carolina (HSSC), a public-private partnership among several of the state’s research universities and teaching hospitals. Greenberg saw HSSC as a way to expand medical research and improve South Carolinians’ health and economic well-being; he now chairs its board of directors.

P hoto b y Roo W ay

P hoto b y Ann B o r d e n , E m o r y U n i v e r s i t y

Creating a Culture of Collaboration

Patience, how you treat other people, has a lot to do with your effectiveness...A lot has to do with creating enough excitement, enough enthusiasm that other people voluntarily subscribe.

Again, creating a culture of collaboration was critical — and it wasn’t easy. It took all of what Greenberg sees as the essential leadership skills. “Do you have the ability to convince other people that your vision makes sense?” he asks. “Is your personality charismatic enough to get people to want to join you? And patience, how you treat other people, has a lot to do with your effectiveness. 8

Dr. Raymond Greenberg, founding dean of the Rollins School of Public Health at Emory University, is now president of the Medical University of South Carolina. He holds a PhD in epidemiology from Carolina’s School of Public Health.

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features & news

p u b l i c h e a lt h l e a d e r s : r ay m o n d g r e e n b e r g

Dr. Raymond Greenberg at Emory University.

“‘H

spring 2008

P hoto b y Roo W ay

P hoto b y Ann B o r d e n , E m o r y U n i v e r s i t y

Creating a Culture of Collaboration

Patience, how you treat other people, has a lot to do with your effectiveness...A lot has to do with creating enough excitement, enough enthusiasm that other people voluntarily subscribe.

continued on page 45 c a r o l i n a p u b l i c h e a lt h

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p u b l i c h e a lt h l e a d e r s : b o b w e e d o n

I enjoy contributing to the community and putting something back in the system.

puppies to

people Weedon understands link between veterinary and public health concerns.

P hoto b y L a u r a J ohnston

r. Bob Weedon spent the Christmas holiday of 2006 as he often has over the years, working in his veterinary hospital in Wilmington, N.C. Things are usually slow then, but this year was different. The condition of a puppy admitted to the clinic with a broken leg in early December had worsened considerably and the staff, who’d named the puppy “Johnny,” was mystified. Weedon suggested they test the dog for rabies.

spring 2008

His hunch led to the diagnosis of the first case of canine rabies in New Hanover County in more than 50 years and initiated a hemisphere-wide, $400,000 effort to corral and inoculate the 50 or so individuals who’d encountered Johnny during his time in the clinic. “We had quite a party in the ER that night,” he recalls, referring to the number of people needing vaccinations. Such events have become a hallmark of Weedon’s career. A Wilmington veterinarian for more than 25 years, he is the senior partner at the College Road Animal Hospital. His clinical, case-based focus has expanded to include a public health perspective. In

the process, he has become a leader in both arenas. “I enjoy contributing to the community and putting something back in the system,” he says. Although he credits his undergraduate advisor at Purdue, Martin Stob, for instilling in him an inclination toward community service, it was an auspicious meeting in 2001 with Dr. Jean McNeil that set Weedon on his current population-based path. McNeil, the animal control services manager for New Hanover (N.C.) County Health Department, was looking for someone to help craft a system to ensure that adopted animals were spayed or neutered. Together, they developed a plan to have animals transferred directly to private veterinary clinics for surgical sterilization before being placed in homes. But the plan resulted in a delay that proved a disincentive to adoption. What was needed to reduce that delay was an on-site spay/neuter facility. So in 2001, at McNeil’s invitation, Weedon joined a team at the University of North Carolina’s Management Academy for Public Health (see page 7), a program of the North Carolina Institute for Public Health, charged with developing a business plan for such a facility. The county subsequently approved the plan developed by the team and built the facility, which soon saw a dramatic increase in adoption numbers and a 100 percent spay/neuter compliance rate. A proponent of life-long learning, Weedon began to consider pursuing a master’s degree in public health. Hollie Pavlica, an advisor for the Management Academy (see page 7) and a graduate and faculty member of UNC’s Public Health Leadership Program (PHLP), encouraged him to consider PHLP, which offers public health certificates and degree programs in traditional and distance learning formats (see page 7). “He was really committed to making a difference in his community,” she remembers, “and he wanted to learn as much as he could.” Weedon elected first to enroll in the School’s Core Concepts in Public Health

Certificate program — a 15-credit program offered in an online format (see www.sph. unc.edu/nciph/certificate). “It had been 20 years since I’d really done anything ‘academic,’” he says, “and I didn’t want to flunk out of a master’s program.” He soon distinguished himself in his certificate courses, and went on to get his master of public health with the Public Health Leadership Program in 2005. “I couldn’t, and wouldn’t, have done it without the distance approach,” he says.

continued on page 45

P hoto b y L a u r a J ohnston

From

“Our friends jokingly refer to my wife and me as a quadra-career couple.” (Sami Winter is a veterinarian as well as a competitive dance instructor and judge.) “If I had tried to do the MPH in a quasi-residence program, even a weekend program, it would have been virtually impossible.” Since his graduation, Weedon has become increasingly involved in public health concerns in his New Hanover County community. He is an adjunct professor at the University of North Carolina-Wilmington, where he teaches a course in Epidemiology and one called “Animals and Human Society,” which he developed. 8

Dr. Bob Weedon (above), a veterinarian in Wilmington, N.C., and faculty adviser and adjunct professor in the Department of Biology and Marine Biology at the University of North Carolina at Wilmington (UNCW), gives a rabies vaccination to a cat at a no-cost rabies clinic co-hosted by the UNCW Pre-Veterinary Medical Association in partnership with New Hanover County Animal Control as part of World Rabies Day on Sept. 8, 2007. Weedon (left) receives a “kiss” from “Tommy” in spring 2006 to celebrate the UNCW Pre-Veterinary Medical Association’s installation of stations that hold baggies for people to pick up animal waste while walking their pets on the UNCW campus. Weedon is a graduate of the UNC School of Public Health’s Public Health Leadership Program, Southeast Public Health Leadership Institute and Management Academy for Public Health. c a r o l i n a p u b l i c h e a lt h

features & news

p u b l i c h e a lt h l e a d e r s : b o b w e e d o n

I enjoy contributing to the community and putting something back in the system.

puppies to

people Weedon understands link between veterinary and public health concerns.

P hoto b y L a u r a J ohnston

spring 2008

continued on page 45

P hoto b y L a u r a J ohnston

From

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p u b l i c h e a lt h l e a d e r s : e d d i e m h l a n g a

To Share

the Vision

and Touch

the Soul

“T

hank you, Jesus!” So rose the shout of praise from the audience when Dr. Roland Edgar (Eddie) Mhlanga, danced across a stage in spring 1994 to accept his master’s of public health diploma from the UNC School of Public Health. More than 40 of the

joyful commencement guests were congregants at Barbee’s Chapel Missionary Baptist Church in Chapel Hill, N.C., a community that nurtured — and felt nurtured by — Mhlanga’s indomitable spirit during the time he spent away from his native South Africa. There was much that brought joy that year. Only days before — on April 27, 1994 — South Africa had held its first democratic elections, with people of all races being able to vote for the first time. For Mhlanga, forced out of his local congregation in the South African village of Acornhoek because he opposed segregation, the North Carolina church family was a special gift. The obstetrician’s journey to the United States was a blessing as well. His wife Lindiwe (“my better three-quarters,” he claims) had been selected as a W.K. Kellogg Scholar at UNC, and Mhlanga traveled to Chapel Hill

spring 2008

with her. Having been involved himself in the Kellogg International Leadership Program, he believed the master’s of public health curriculum at UNC offered analytical skills, competencies, and an understanding of community development that would be of great benefit to his and Lindiwe’s work in Acornhoek. Now head of the Department of Obstetrics and Gynecology at the Nelson R. Mandela School of Medicine in Durban, South Africa, and adjunct associate professor in the Department of Maternal and Child Health at the UNC School of Public Health, Mhlanga is champion of the rural poor and a stalwart advocate for women’s and children’s health. He was drawn to the specialty, he says, because of desperate need in South Africa for advanced obstetric, gynecologic and pediatric skills during emergencies. As in the United States, many South African physicians are not willing to serve in poor, rural

Dr. Roland Edgar (Eddie) Mhlanga

areas after they finish their long training. While serving as the first director of Maternal, Child and Women’s Health and Genetics in the National Department of Health in Pretoria, Mhlanga lobbied for reproductive and sexual health and rights — work that in 1996 resulted in South Africa’s Choice on Termination of Pregnancy Act and later, legislation for the Notification of and Confidential Enquiry into Maternal Deaths. In 1999, as chief director of national health programs, he became involved in policymaking and education about nutrition and prevention and treatment of HIV/ AIDS, tuberculosis, and sexually transmitted diseases. Subsequently, Mhlanga’s leadership in women’s and children’s health has been solicited by international agencies such as the World Health Organization and United Nations agencies including the Children’s

Fund (UNICEF) and the Educational, Scientific and Cultural Organization (UNESCO), among others. In 2005, he became a member of the board of Ipas, an international Chapel Hillbased agency that works to protect women’s sexual and reproductive rights and ensure that the termination of pregnancy is a safe procedure for those who seek it. Elizabeth Maguire, president and CEO of the organization, notes that “Dr. Mhlanga has been a consistent and passionate supporter of women’s reproductive rights, a man of conviction who has identified himself with issues such as abortion and HIV/AIDS that are often stigmatized. His leadership was pivotal to giving women in South Africa access to legal abortion in the 1990s, and he continues as a leading advocate to protect their rights under continuing challenges. He is a man of extraordinary integrity, compassion, spirituality, vision and eloquence.” Mhlanga is humble about his accomplishments. “The time [spent] in Chapel Hill allowed me to meet amazing people in the School and the Chapel Hill community. It affirmed that the challenges people face are the same all over the globe. We can all learn from one another.”

“Life is a great gift,” he adds, “and living it right — in harmony with people and the environment — is the greatest opportunity one has.” Mhlanga feels rewarded by the impact he has made on the lives of women in South Africa and honored to have been part of the great changes that have swept his country. He is immensely proud of his two daughters, one of whom has begun to follow in her father’s footsteps by earning a joint Bachelor of

nan Professor Emeritus John Hatch (“who embodies what I want to become — a father and mentor to many, walking the talk and leading, by example, in humility”). The leader he admires most, though, is his late mother. “Sennie Mankareng n’waMalapane knew hunger and distress,” Mhlanga recalls, “but made certain her children did not sleep with hunger. [She] taught me that my sibling is the person next to me. [She] taught me diligence and discipline,

Life is a great gift and living it right—in harmony with people and the environment— is the greatest opportunity one has. Medicine and Bachelor of Surgery degree at the Nelson R. Mandela School of Medicine, University of KwaZulu-Natal, Durban. He delights in colleagues and friends he has made around the world and is grateful for leaders who have inspired him — Martin Luther King Jr. (“more concerned with justice than material gain”), Nelson Mandela and Mahatma Gandhi (for reminding him that “preoccupation with the past takes time away from the future”), and UNC Ke-

without which I would not have been where I am today.” All these leaders, Mhlanga says, have been “able to communicate their understanding of the human condition and to transcend human barriers by touching the soul and heart of people. That attribute,” he says, “makes a great leader — to share the vision and touch the soul.” It’s a description that fits him well. n — B y L i nd a K a stl e m a n

Dr. Eddie Mhlanga (center) is welcomed into the home of Dr. and Mrs. Gebreamlak Ogbaselassie during an October 2007 visit to Eritrea. Mhlanga, adjunct associate professor in UNC-Chapel Hill’s Department of Maternal and Child Health, worked with the Eritrea Ministry of Health and the World Health Organization to devise a system for notification of and enquiry into maternal and newborn deaths in that country. Mhlanga is head of the Department of Obstetrics and Gynecology at the Nelson R. Mandela School of Medicine in Durban, South Africa, and holds a master’s in public health from UNC. Ogbaselassie is an obstetrician/ gynecologist and adviser to the Eritrea Ministry of Health. c a r o l i n a p u b l i c h e a lt h

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p u b l i c h e a lt h l e a d e r s : e d d i e m h l a n g a

To Share

the Vision

and Touch

the Soul

“T

spring 2008

Dr. Roland Edgar (Eddie) Mhlanga

features & news

Efﬁcient, reliable injury data collection saves lives Y

ears ago, electric frying pans, coffee pots and other kitchen appliances came with long cords so people could put them anywhere on the counter, no matter where the electric plug was. But long cords were easy for children to grab, pull, and dump hot coffee, grease or other liquids on themselves. Thanks to the U.S. Consumer Product Safety Commission, appliance cords are now short. Bicycles no longer have long “banana seats” that tempt children to add extra riders. Paint no longer contains added lead. Crib rails are close enough together so that a baby’s head can’t fit through. Child safety seats are engineering marvels. UNC School of Public Health Alumnus Dr. Robert Verhalen created the data collection system for the Consumer Product Safety Commission that led to these and many other life-saving, injury-reducing changes. For 22 years, he headed the Commission’s epidemiology section, collecting data about injuries all over the country. The Commission then used those data to decide which products to investigate and regulate, and what actions to recommend to Congress. “He was a pioneer in product safety,” says Dr. Carol Runyan, director of the UNC Injury Prevention Research Center. “He was a very innovative, important con-

spring 2008

tributor to injury prevention throughout his career at the Consumer Product Safety Commission.” Runyan nominated Verhalen for the American Public Health Association’s Distinguished Career Award, which he received in 1999.

“There weren’t enough parasites in Lake County to keep me busy,” he says, “so they made me a sanitarian and the safety representative.” He had no background in safety, so when he heard Carolina’s School of Public Health was offering a one-week course in injury prevention, he signed up. “I was fascinated by it,” he says. “I decided I wanted to come back to Carolina and get a master’s degree.” That fall, he packed up his family and moved to Chapel Hill to study health administration. One year later, degree in hand, he went to Atlanta as the housing hygiene and accident prevention consultant for the Georgia Department of Health. He also was in charge of 11 poison control centers across Georgia. “I started trying to do research on

He was a pioneer in product safety...a very innovative, important contributor to injury prevention throughout his career at the Consumer Product Safety Commission. A native of Lake Bluff, Ill., Verhalen joined the Marine Corps after high school, then went to the University of Iowa on the GI bill, studying zoology with a concentration in parasitology. After graduation, he became the parasitologist for the Lake County, Ill., health department.

accidents,” he says, “but I didn’t have sufficient analytic tools in statistics and epidemiology.” He contacted his teachers at UNC — Drs. John Cassel and Al Tyroler — and asked if he could get a doctorate in epidemiology with a concentration in injury prevention.

While earning his DrPH, he worked at the UNC Highway Safety Research Center and in the School’s Department of Health Administration. In his second year, he was asked to assume leadership of the injury task force on a presidential commission on product safety, which, in 1970, recommended establishing the National Consumer Product Safety Commission. He was appointed head of the new agency’s Bureau of Epidemiology when it was established in 1973. His first challenge was to find a way to collect reliable data. “Historically, the federal government had been relying on newspaper stories, small local studies and that kind of thing,” he says. “That wasn’t adequate.” The commission agreed to define “injury” as an event requiring professional medical attention. He enlisted 14 hospitals as a pilot test to report injuries treated in their emergency rooms. “In the first nine months, those 14 hospitals reported 85,000 cases,” he says, “so we knew that system was going to work, so we went national.” It became known as the National Electronic Injury Surveillance System (NEISS). Eventually, Verhalen’s system was used to collect other sorts of data, including injuries caused by medical devices and nonprescription drugs for the U.S. Food and Drug Administration; injuries caused by firearms for the U.S. Department of Justice; and injuries caused by environmental factors for the Environmental Protection Agency. After a while, NEISS collected data from hospital emergency departments for 11 different federal agencies. “It was much more cost-effective for the government and much less of an administrative burden on the emergency rooms” than having separate systems, he says. When Verhalen retired from the Consumer Product Safety Commission in 1995, he planned to sail through the Great Lakes, down the Mississippi River and around Florida. “But as soon as word got out I was going to retire, my phone started ringing,” he says. He was in hot demand by many companies

P hoto b y Pa ul C r a n e

p u b l i c h e a lt h l e a d e r s : r o b e r t v e r h a l e n

as an injury analysis consultant. He started a consulting business with his son. Then, in late 2007, he started working with the Children’s Hospital of Philadelphia, researching traffic safety injuries. He and his wife, Phyllis, still live in the Washington suburbs of Virginia, and Verhalen is a member of the School’s Public Health Foundation, Inc., Board of Directors. “I sold the sailboat,” he says. “I’m still having too much fun with my career.” n

Dr. Robert Verhalen created the data collection system for the Consumer Product Safety Commission that led to many life-saving, injury-reducing changes throughout the United States. Verhalen holds a doctorate in epidemiology from Carolina’s School of Public Health.

– B y R a m on a D u B os e c a r o l i n a p u b l i c h e a lt h

features & news

Efﬁcient, reliable injury data collection saves lives Y

spring 2008

P hoto b y Pa ul C r a n e

p u b l i c h e a lt h l e a d e r s : r o b e r t v e r h a l e n

– B y R a m on a D u B os e c a r o l i n a p u b l i c h e a lt h

features & news

A recipe for leadership:

Put in time on the

ground, and aim high

n 2003, Dr. Greg Allgood asked Procter and Gamble to do something unheard of — intentionally pursue a product that wasn’t making any money.

Dr. Greg Allgood (above) holds a young Kenyan boy during a June 2007 visit to Kibera — one of Africa’s largest slums in Nairobi, Kenya. Allgood, director of the Children’s Safe Drinking Water Project at Procter & Gamble, was visiting a local women’s group that was educating people on safe drinking water. He earned a master’s in environmental sciences and engineering from UNC-Chapel Hill. (Right) Allgood visits with rural school children in a September 2006 trip to Haiti. Over the next three years, the Children’s Safe Drinking Water Project will reach one million school children with safe drinking water education and information about PUR packets — sachets of disinfection chemicals that can clean 10 liters of water in minutes.

spring 2008

Allgood, who earned his master’s in environmental sciences and engineering from Carolina’s School of Public Health in 1983, had worked at Procter and Gamble (P&G) on everything from Pantene shampoo to the Olestra fat substitute. In 2001, he joined the team developing the PUR sachet, a packet of flocculation and disinfection chemicals that can clean 10 liters of water in minutes. The company tried selling it in developing countries such as Guatemala, but found it hard to make a profit. Making sales required an extensive investment in public health education about the need for clean water. But Allgood lobbied P&G to continue developing PUR, not just by handing if off

sells the product at cost. “By providing the product at cost for other groups that see value in it, we can expand the program much more than if we used the program to just subsidize it and give it away,” Allgood says. After buying the product at cost, nongovernmental organizations and small-scale retailers in developing countries can sell it at a small profit. Bob Shimp, leader of P&G’s Global

typical approach that P&G takes.” Shimp attributes Allgood’s success to his willingness to “be on the ground promoting what he believes in,” both with P&G leadership and in countries where PUR is needed. When Allgood demonstrates PUR in the field, he’s always the first to take a drink, says Lisa Jones Christensen, an assistant professor at UNC’s Kenan-Flagler Business School who’s writing a case study of the drinking water

As a leader, sometimes you can motivate someone who is already good to be even better. Regulatory Community of Practice and a 1984 alumnus of the School’s doctoral program, says that Allgood’s ability to get people behind his vision has brought to life “a very novel business model that was not the

project. “He is very hands-on in the field and seems to have a real heart for this work,” Christensen says. Allgood learned the importance of spending time on the ground from former P&G

CEO John Pepper. “I was lucky enough to work with him early in my career and learn that to be a great leader you have to be willing to serve,” Allgood says. P&G’s Children’s Safe Drinking Water Project has won numerous awards, including the Presidential Ron Brown Award for Corporate Leadership, and Allgood himself in 2007 won the Johns Hopkins Bloomberg School of Public Health’s Center for Communications Programs Gold Medallion Award. Allgood says he learned to aim high from at least one leader from the UNC School of Public Health — the late Dr. Edward Kuenzler, whose research specialized in the study of lakes, rivers and streams. “He had higher expectations of me than he did of some other people, and he let me know that,” Allgood says. “At first, I thought that was very unfair. But I learned that as a leader, sometimes you can motivate someone who is already good to be even better.” n – B y Ang e l a S p i v e y P hoto cou r t e s y of P r oct e r a nd G a m bl e

P hoto cou r t e s y of P r oct e r a nd G a m bl e

p u b l i c h e a lt h l e a d e r s : g r eg a l lg o o d

to an aid organization, but by creating a nonprofit group within the company. Why? “My motivation was emotionally seeing how much people wanted it,” Allgood says. During a visit to Kenya, Allgood talked to a woman who was drawing water from a stream where cattle had just defecated. “We took the woman’s water and cleaned it for her with the product, and while we were talking about it, a man came along and stole her bucket of clean water,” he says. “She got down on her hands and knees and begged us for more packets.” Out of Allgood’s pitch came P&G’s Children’s Safe Drinking Water Project, which donates PUR sachets to aid groups and also c a r o l i n a p u b l i c h e a lt h

features & news

A recipe for leadership:

Put in time on the

ground, and aim high

n 2003, Dr. Greg Allgood asked Procter and Gamble to do something unheard of — intentionally pursue a product that wasn’t making any money.

spring 2008

project. “He is very hands-on in the field and seems to have a real heart for this work,” Christensen says. Allgood learned the importance of spending time on the ground from former P&G

P hoto cou r t e s y of P r oct e r a nd G a m bl e

p u b l i c h e a lt h l e a d e r s : g r eg a l lg o o d

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p u b l i c h e a lt h l e a d e r s : l i l l i a n r i v e r a

Develop collaborative practices, says head of Miami-Dade County Health Department Dr. Lillian Rivera

D r . L illi a n R i v er a , a dministr ator of the M i a mi -Da de C ou nt y (F l a .) H e a lth D epa rtment, w h at the k eys to public he a lth le a dership a r e , her a nsw er is sw ift a nd sur e : Passion , lov e for the commu nit y you serv e , a nd contin uous le a r ning . hen you ask

Colleagues validate that passion and love of community. “Her work is truly a calling. She has dedicated her entire career to improving the health status of our community and mentoring others,” says Nancy Humbert, vice president of strategic business planning and public affairs for Miami Children’s Hospital. Rivera’s position includes the oversight and supervision of public health programs throughout the county of 2.5 million people. Over the past several years, she has reorganized the operation of the health department following the Malcolm Baldrige model of performance excellence. Baldrige, U.S. secretary of commerce from 1981 to 1987, was a proponent of quality management as a key to prosperity and long-term strength. His managerial excellence contributed to long-term improvement in efficiency and effectiveness of government and led the U.S. Congress to name the Malcolm Baldrige National Quality Improvement Act of 1987 after him. Baldrige’s criteria for excellence includes seven areas: leadership; strategic

spring 2008

planning; customer and market focus; measurement, analysis, and knowledge management; human resource focus; process management; and results. “With nearly 1,000 employees, we had to explain the value of this goal of transforming our organization and sell our employees on

marked and sustained improvement in key performance measures across the board,” says JoAnne Kroesen, director of the Office of Organizational Development and Public Health Nursing in the Miami-Dade health department. “She has the unique ability to strategically bring all levels of key stakeholders and customer groups together to develop collaborative partnerships and initiatives in an effort to improve and resolve public health issues.” Rivera, a native of Puerto Rico, believes in helping her staff find training opportunities. She has sent Miami-Dade health department

I believe that collaborative practices need to be developed and sustained by leadership. the process,” says Rivera, a registered nurse and graduate of the UNC School of Public Health’s National Public Health Leadership Institute (see page 7). The focus on quality worked. Since its reorganization, the Miami-Dade health department has won the Florida Governor’s Sterling Award for Performance Excellence twice. “Lillian’s unwavering commitment to drive and implement a performance excellence model throughout the Miami-Dade County Health Department resulted in

teams to attend the School’s Management Academy for Public Health, a nine-month executive education program of the North Carolina Institute for Public Health (see page 7). “I believe that collaborative practices need to be developed and sustained by leadership,” she says. “Continuous learning and advancing the performance of our organizations is essential for viability and sustainability.” n – B y B e v H olt

p u b l i c h e a lt h l e a d e r s : v i c t o r C ác e r e s

Building partnerships to stop disease D

r. Victor Cáceres is a lot of things: board-certified clinician, researcher, and a field epidemiologist who has investigated disease outbreaks. His friend and colleague, Dr. Augusto Lopez, says, “Victor’s participation always opens doors instead of closing them.” A captain in the Commissioned Corps of the U.S. Public Health Service, Cáceres serves as team leader for the Centers for Disease Control’s Field Epidemiology Training Program (FETP) in Central America, which trains epidemiologists to investigate disease outbreaks and promote public health in six countries. Cáceres, who received his medical degree from the UNC School of Medicine and his master’s in maternal and child health from the UNC School of Public Health, is reluctant to call himself a leader, but likes the concept of servant leadership. “I like that attitude of a leader as a person developing others to help them become leaders themselves,” he says. That’s just what Cáceres does in his work with the FETP. The effort began as one regional training program managed by 8 Dr. Victor Cáceres poses for a photograph with his wife, Susan, and son, Nicholas. Cáceres is a team leader for the Centers for Disease Control’s Field Epidemiology Training Program in Central America, which trains epidemiologists to investigate disease outbreaks and promote public health in six countries. He earned his master’s in maternal and child health from UNC. c a r o l i n a p u b l i c h e a lt h

features & news

p u b l i c h e a lt h l e a d e r s : l i l l i a n r i v e r a

Develop collaborative practices, says head of Miami-Dade County Health Department Dr. Lillian Rivera

spring 2008

p u b l i c h e a lt h l e a d e r s : v i c t o r C ác e r e s

Building partnerships to stop disease D

features & news

Dr. Victor Cáceres gives an oral polio vaccine to a young girl in the Dominican Republic as part of a response to an outbreak of polio in that country in 2000.

8 the Centers for Disease Control (CDC), in partnership with the ministries of health in the six countries. Gradually, each country is taking ownership of its own program. “We’re helping countries build sustainable programs to improve their public health systems. We’re doing it in a way that creates selfsufficiency, and that’s very exciting,” Cáceres says. “Our role now is finding ways for them to collaborate, to maintain the quality of the curriculum, and to work with partners to see that the elements are in place for these programs to remain and flourish.” Part of that effort includes a cooperative agreement in which the FETP develops curriculum materials with universities, including UNCChapel Hill, and Dr. Pia MacDonald, research assistant professor of epidemiology in the School of Public Health. Dr. Augusto Lopez, a medical epidemiologist and regional advisor in FETP who has worked with Cáceres for about three years, says the six countries in which FETP operates often experience changes in government leadership. Through it all, Lopez says that Cáceres maintains a clear vision that he conveys to

spring 2008

p u b l i c h e a lt h l e a d e r s : A l i c e W h i t e

p u b l i c h e a lt h l e a d e r s : v i c t o r C ác e r e s

whomever is in charge, and continually builds bridges between the CDC, the FETP offices in each country, and the ministries of health in Central America. Cáceres brings his ability to see issues from many different perspectives to his job. “There’s no doubt that the CDC is a leader in epidemiology and public health, but we also have a lot to learn from the other countries,” Cáceres says. “There’s a lot of give-and-take and back-and-forth, constant interaction and problem-solving.”

lina outbreak of Cyclospora (a pathogen that causes diarrheal illness) to raspberries imported from Guatemala. He ended up traveling to Guatemala to find the source of the outbreak and talking with farmers who were understandably skeptical. In addition, over several years, Cáceres applied his team-building approach to eradicating polio. “He has contributed greatly to polio eradication by taking leadership in the research area,” says Roland Sutter, director of research and product development for polio eradication at the World Health Organization. Sutter points to Cáceres’ perseverance and diplomacy in implementing a study of inactivated polio vaccine (IPV) in Cuba. Unlike other developing countries, Cuba has eradicated polio and doesn’t routinely give the oral vaccine, which is made of an attenuated live virus. That made Cuba a perfect testing ground to find out if the alternative, IPV, will really be effective once polio is eradicated and the oral vaccine phased out. “We were able to show the IPV worked in the polio-free environment,” Cáceres says. The Cuba IPV study was published in 2007 in the New England Journal of Medicine. For Cáceres, the partnerships he forms in every aspect of his work aren’t just about

As the world becomes more of a global community, it’s the relationship building that we do in our work that will enable the countries to form teams in responding to a major pandemic. It doesn’t hurt that Cáceres knows Central America well; his parents emigrated from Honduras two months before he was born. He visited there often as a child and still has extended family there. Cáceres also knows what it’s like for epidemiologists learning to work in the field. From 1995 to 1997, he served as a member of the CDC’s Epidemic Intelligence Service, on which the FETP is modeled. Cáceres was part of a group that traced a South Caro-

playing nice; they’re necessary to ensure global health. “As the world becomes more of a global community, it’s the relationshipbuilding that we do in our work that will enable the countries to form teams in responding to a major pandemic,” Cáceres says. “That goodwill is capital that’s hard to measure but extremely important because it will help us when we have to unite against a disease threat.” n — B y Ang e l a S p i v e y

Assessing what happens in the real world,

Epidemiologists

provide compass

for pharmaceutical

research Dr. Alice White

efor e ph a r m aceutica l compa nies decide w her e to focus r ese a rch , they wa nt to k now w h at the u nmet needs a r e .

They

wa nt to k now a bout the dise ases — a nd the patients —

they hope to tr e at.

That’s where pharmaceutical epidemiologists like Dr. Alice White come in. White, who has a doctorate in epidemiology from Carolina’s School of Public Health, is vice president of Worldwide Epidemiology at GlaxoSmithKline (GSK). She leads a team of about 70 GSK epidemiologists and data analysts in North Carolina, Pennsylvania, London, Brazil, Japan and Singapore. “My department is about diseases, not drugs,” she says. “We help the company and industry understand diseases at the population level. When they’re making decisions about drug discovery and development, they need to know who the patients are and how the disease is affecting them.” She didn’t start off planning to be a scholar with global executive responsibilities. In fact, White left college and moved with her husband to Pinehurst, N.C., to raise horses. But by 1977, she found herself a single mother working as a secretary. She was challenged

Dr. Alice White is vice president of Worldwide Epidemiology at GlaxoSmithKline. She holds a doctorate in epidemiology from Carolina.

financially but not intellectually. Determined to improve her situation, she applied to UNC and moved to Carrboro to complete work on her bachelor’s degree in psychology. Later, she enrolled in the School of Public Health to study epidemiology and became an assistant professor after graduation. In 1990, she joined Burroughs Wellcome (now GSK), focusing on the epidemiology of HIV infection. Today, White and other GSK epidemiologists assess the spread and characteristics of obesity, Type II diabetes, cancers and psychiatric diseases around the world, as well as autoimmune diseases like rheumatoid arthritis and lupus. “We start there, studying the disease in the real world,” she says, “but epidemiologists are now involved in so many levels of the process.” Once, the primary role of pharmaceutical epidemiologists was to assess how medicines were being used after they were out in the market, she says. Clinical trials measure use in a very controlled population, but once medicines are available in the “real world,” epidemiologists

track how they are used, by whom and with what results, she explains. “Epidemiologists apply methods to the data available and look at the risks associated with use of the drug,” she adds. “It goes deeper and broader than what you learn just from spontaneous (side effect) reports.” This role is still critical, but the role of epidemiologists is expanding, she says. While GSK and most other major pharmaceutical companies are downsizing, her department has expanded from 20 people in 2000 to 75 now. “The biggest challenge we’re facing today,” she says, “is the appropriate use of patient data. So much is available now, with electronic medical records and other computer-based ways of collecting data. But we have to look at quality control and standardized approaches to make sense of the data — to make it really meaningful.” White was instrumental in GSK’s $3 million gift to the School of Public Health in 2003 to establish the UNC-GSK Center for Excellence in Pharmacoepidemiology and Public Health (see page 60). “The key is understanding diseases,” she says. “Epidemiology is about populations — about public health — much more than just about medicines. It’s a foundation GSK recognizes is critical to the process.” n — B y R a m on a D u B os e

c a r o l i n a p u b l i c h e a lt h

features & news

Dr. Victor Cáceres gives an oral polio vaccine to a young girl in the Dominican Republic as part of a response to an outbreak of polio in that country in 2000.

8 the Centers for Disease Control (CDC), in partnership with the ministries of health in the six countries. Gradually, each country is taking ownership of its own program. “We’re helping countries build sustainable programs to improve their public health systems. We’re doing it in a way that creates selfsufficiency, and that’s very exciting,” Cáceres says. “Our role now is finding ways for them to collaborate, to maintain the quality of the curriculum, and to work with partners to see that the elements are in place for these programs to remain and flourish.” Part of that effort includes a cooperative agreement in which the FETP develops curriculum materials with universities, including UNCChapel Hill, and Dr. Pia McDonald, research assistant professor of epidemiology in the School of Public Health. Dr. Augusto Lopez, a medical epidemiologist and regional advisor in FETP who has worked with Cáceres for about three years, says the six countries in which FETP operates often experience changes in government leadership. Through it all, Lopez says that Cáceres maintains a clear vision that he conveys to

spring 2008

p u b l i c h e a lt h l e a d e r s : A l i c e W h i t e

p u b l i c h e a lt h l e a d e r s : v i c t o r C ác e r e s

Assessing what happens in the real world,

Epidemiologists

provide compass

for pharmaceutical

research Dr. Alice White

efor e ph a r m aceutica l compa nies decide w her e to focus r ese a rch , they wa nt to k now w h at the u nmet needs a r e .

They

wa nt to k now a bout the dise ases — a nd the patients —

they hope to tr e at.

Dr. Alice White is vice president of Worldwide Epidemiology at GlaxoSmithKline. She holds a doctorate in epidemiology from Carolina.

c a r o l i n a p u b l i c h e a lt h

features & news

p u b l i c h e a lt h l e a d e r s : d o n h o l z w o r t h

Transforming Health through

Passionate

Leadership

assion moves people to do great things. Just ask Don Holzworth, senior vice president and director of strategy for SRA International, Inc., and founder and former chairman and CEO of Constella Group, a global professional health services company. Holzworth has been thinking a lot about passion and how it relates to his success and the success of others. This thinking is not just an exercise for him. It is how he lives his life. In the early stages of writing a book about leadership for small business owners and embarking on new philanthropic and strategic ventures, this self-described Type A personality is convinced now more than ever that a burning desire to pursue a vision is perhaps one of the most important traits a leader can have. “For me, the responsibility of a leader is to create a gap between what everyone thinks and does today and what you want them to be thinking or doing tomorrow,” he says. “Passion allows the leader to create that gap,

spring 2008

and people begin to naturally follow the new thinking because the passion and the new thinking are compelling.” Jesse Milan Jr., senior principal for health policy and promotion at the SRA Constella Group, says, “I’ve seen Don test the waters by exposing his own passion in front of others, and I’ve seen the remarkable response it generated. People truly appreciate leaders who are open and honest about what motivates them.” Holzworth says he’s always been intense, even during his formative years growing up in Illinois. But it wasn’t until mid-career that he began expressing the motivation behind his drive. “I’m passionate about what I do because of my father, who was a general practitio-

How one

Don Holzworth is senior vice president and director of strategy for SRA International, Inc., and founder and former chairman and CEO of Constella Group. He is a member of the UNC School of Public Health’s Advisory Council and has been instrumental in helping fund the DrPH program in the School’s Department of Health Policy and Administration.

executive fuels progress both here and abroad ner,” Holzworth says. “He didn’t make a lot of money, and didn’t seem to mind. He was devoted to healing people. The meaning he brought to my life was enhanced midway through my career. At that point, I saw clearly that I really wanted to do something to improve the health of people around the world.” When he did open up and share about his father’s work, something interesting and valuable happened to him. “I’d find people coming up to me sharing their own health-related experiences after I told them about my father,” says Holzworth, who with his wife Jennifer, has two children, Chelsea and David. “Whether it was their own parents involved in medicine or a sister who died of breast cancer, they shared their lives with me. I think it made a real difference. I think it made me more believable as a leader. It also made being a leader more interesting. I felt connected to people.” That believability, Holzworth says, contributed to the company’s success. Stitching together a number of diverse companies, he quickly built Constella, one of the most profitable and fastest growing health services companies in the United States, garnering

financial and professional rewards along the way, including several Ernst & Young Entrepreneur of the Year™ awards. Constella, now a division of SRA International, Inc., operates in 60 countries and is on the cutting edge of health initiatives being implemented worldwide. His vision — to provide governmental and commercial clients with a wide range of health services — has worked, and Holzworth says his passion made it happen. It wasn’t without a price. Holzworth says some people, including employees, didn’t always buy into his vision. He also experienced the pangs of sometimes overwhelming or scaring people with his grand ideas. “Passion in that case can be a burden, “he says. “Sometimes you have to back away, engage with people and have real empathy for where they are. It’s all part of being vulnerable — to not be afraid to say that you don’t know something or to expose your own weaknesses. I do this, even when it is hard for me to do.” A strategy Holzworth implemented to drive results was to consciously disrupt things when business was good. He would, for example, seek out and make another

Don Holzworth

was a little bit of tonic, but I did it because I knew that change is hard.” If change is Holzworth’s engine for accomplishment, then passion continues to be the high-octane fuel. As a result of the merger with SRA, Holzworth no longer runs day-today operations as a chief executive officer.

The responsibility of a leader is to create a gap between what everyone thinks and does today and what you want them to be thinking or doing tomorrow. acquisition or even bring in a new executive with a different way of thinking. “At the beginning of every year, I told my employees that our business was not going to be the same a year later,” he says. “I felt it was better to communicate that than not. It

Instead, the senior vice president now pursues more strategic opportunities for SRA and Constella, such as finding new markets, leveraging current customers and finding gaps in the markets to fill. He’s also focusing on helping more people through philanthropic

and nonprofit endeavors, both in the United States and Africa. One of his goals is to continue to help the School of Public Health. As a member of the School’s Advisory Council, Holzworth has been instrumental in helping fund the DrPH program in the School’s Department of Health Policy and Administration (see pages 6 and 32). Holzworth and his wife Jennifer also have created endowed scholarships for doctoral students in health policy at the School of Public Health. The scholarships are named in honor of their fathers, Arthur B. Holzworth and Charles A. Zeatch. “I’m absolutely passionate about what I want to do right now,” says Holzworth, “and I’m looking forward to fulfilling that passion. My intention is to continue to make a difference in the lives of people. In that respect, I’m very lucky to be able to do different things.” n – B y G e n e P i nd e r

c a r o l i n a p u b l i c h e a lt h

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p u b l i c h e a lt h l e a d e r s : d o n h o l z w o r t h

Transforming Health through

Passionate

Leadership

spring 2008

How one

Don Holzworth

c a r o l i n a p u b l i c h e a lt h

features & news

p u b l i c h e a lt h l e a d e r s : n i co l e b at e s

she combines both attributes, and does so in a low-key, self-effacing style that leaves everyone feeling that they have been heard and that their own interests have been served. She not only holds promise for a remarkable future, she is already a key player in moving the global health agenda forward in ways that serve our entire community.” Bates leads a four-person team at the Washington, D.C.-based Global Health Council. Responsible for developing and implementing a strategy to convince policymakers and opinion leaders to put more resources towards global health initiatives, Bates applies newly learned leadership les-

Growing into

Leadership Nicole Bates

icol e

B at e s

se e ms to be mov i ng qu ick ly u p t h e pu bl ic

h e a lt h l e a der sh i p l a dder .

g ov er n m en t r el at ions for t h e

self-described strategic thinker and likes to plan two, three and even four steps ahead while playing with different future scenarios. So you’d think her career trajectory was carefully plotted. There’s only one problem. You’d be wrong. Bates never set out to be a leader. In fact, she originally found her calling as a policy analyst with the national Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) in Atlanta shortly after getting her master’s in public health from UNC in health behavior and education. Reserved by nature, Bates originally felt more comfortable listening carefully to others in group settings than speaking up. She was, after all, often the youngest person in the meetings. But then something started happening. When she did speak, people listened, especially since her comments were insightful, thoughtful and precise. Eventually, her colleagues started coming to her for advice and counsel. In other words, Bates found herself growing into a leadership role, and she enjoyed it. Bates is one of nine members of the first cohort in the School’s distance learning

spring 2008

Th e cu r r e n t di r ec tor of G loba l H e a lt h C ou nci l is

p u b l i c h e a lt h l e a d e r s : a a r o n b l a i r

Executive Doctoral Program in Health Leadership. She and her classmates have just completed two years of coursework and are now completing dissertations that will culminate this year with DrPH degrees. “These are highly accomplished individuals with proven leadership capacity and incredible passion for what they do,” says Dr. Suzanne Havala Hobbs, director of the program. “Once they leave our executive DrPH program, look for them in top positions of

tions in organizations working to improve the public’s health. Generous funding for technical support and student financial aid for the program is provided by The Constella Group. Don Holzworth, senior vice president and director of strategy for SRA International, Inc., and founder and former chairman and CEO of Constella Group, has been instrumental in helping fund the DrPH program (see pages 6 and 30). For more information on the program, see www.sph. unc.edu/hpaa/executive_drph. In describing Bates’ leadership style, Dr. Nils Daulaire, president and CEO of the Global Health Council says: “In Washington,

Facilitating dialogue and translating stakeholder buy-in into action is something that strong leaders do well. leadership in the U.S. and around the world working to improve the health of all people.” The program is the nation’s first doctorate in health leadership (DrPH) degree that students can earn while taking all of their classes online from their homes or offices (see page 6). It is designed for working professionals in mid-career who have the capacity and drive to assume top posi-

there are generally two sets of characters: the operatives and the strategists. The former know who’s who and what it takes to move from point A to point B in the messy world of politics. The latter have the big picture in mind, a clear sense of what ultimately needs to be accomplished and a deep understanding of the substantive issues. Nicole is highly unusual and extraordinarily valuable in that

sons to the many ongoing challenges she and her team face. One of her biggest challenges? Finding enough common ground to move the global health agenda forward. “My team and I spend our days working to convince an incredibly diverse set of stakeholders that our priority is their priority,” she says. “It’s not easy. In a single issue, for example, we have to identify elements that resonate with different audiences, yet preserve the issue’s overall integrity.” Bates says this policy tension has brought out what she considers one of her signature leadership traits — the ability to focus and synthesize differences into a shared plat-

form, especially when others are all over the map with their specific agendas. “When I step back, I realize that facilitating dialogue and translating stakeholder buy-in into action is something that strong leaders do well,” she says. “Given my work, I have the opportunity to refine that skill almost daily.” Somehow boundaries don’t seem to fit into any description of Nicole Bates, not when she’s still learning, improving — and, most importantly of all, growing into her leadership role. You’d think she had planned it that way, but of course you’d be wrong. n — B y G e n e P i nd e r

School alum revolutionizes study of occupational

epidemiology

A aron B lair’s

first taste of public health ca me from an

unlikely quarter . While working as a lectur er in 1973 at S aint A ndr ews P r esbyterian C ollege in L aurinburg , N.C., he was asked to teach a course in human anatomy and physiology.

Problem was, Blair’s undergraduate and master’s degrees were in botany, and his doctorate was in genetics. To learn about human physiology, he chose to attend the UNC School of Public Health. That decision changed the course of his professional life and gave the study of cancer one of its most accomplished advocates. Once at UNC, Blair became hooked on epidemiology. He earned his master’s degree from the School in 1976 and went on to pursue a career in public health that culminated as chief of the Occupational and Environmental Epidemiology Branch of the National Cancer Institute (NCI) for more than 25 years. At NCI, Blair oversaw the expansion of the branch from four investigators to more than 30. He was among the first to

revolutionize the study of occupational epidemiology by introducing quantitative and molecular methods of assessing exposure to environmental hazards. His work on case studies among farmers in the Midwest pointed to the role of pesticides and agricultural chemicals in the high incidence of specific types of cancer among the farmer populations. That effort led to the large-scale Agricultural Health Study he pioneered, which measured various health outcomes over a 15-year period among agricultural workers in Iowa and North Carolina. Over the years, Blair has been the recipient of numerous awards, including the School’s 2007 Barr Distinguished Alumni Award for contributions to public health; the National Institutes of Health Director’s Award; and the John Goldsmith Award for Outstanding

Dr. Aaron Blair

Contributions to Epidemiology, for his work on occupational and environmental causes of cancer. “The UNC School of Public Health is a very high-caliber and prestigious school,” Blair notes, adding that the expertise of scientists at the School and the resources available to students and faculty “come together in helping to further an individual career.” Blair retired as branch chief at the NCI in 2006. An avid golfer, he now divides his time between academic pursuits, golf and his four grandchildren. n – B y P r a sh a nt N a i r , P h D c a r o l i n a p u b l i c h e a lt h

features & news

p u b l i c h e a lt h l e a d e r s : n i co l e b at e s

Growing into

Leadership Nicole Bates

icol e

B at e s

se e ms to be mov i ng qu ick ly u p t h e pu bl ic

h e a lt h l e a der sh i p l a dder .

g ov er n m en t r el at ions for t h e

spring 2008

Th e cu r r e n t di r ec tor of G loba l H e a lt h C ou nci l is

p u b l i c h e a lt h l e a d e r s : a a r o n b l a i r

School alum revolutionizes study of occupational

epidemiology

A aron B lair’s

first taste of public health ca me from an

unlikely quarter . While working as a lectur er in 1973 at S aint A ndr ews P r esbyterian C ollege in L aurinburg , N.C., he was asked to teach a course in human anatomy and physiology.

Dr. Aaron Blair

features & news

p u b l i c h e a lt h l e a d e r s : ly n n m o u d e n

Putting Teeth in Public Health D

r. Lynn Mouden has been called a communist, fascist and even the minion of the devil.

That’s on a good day.

As the director of the Arkansas Health Department’s Office of Oral Health, this UNC School of Public Health graduate has seen his share of concerned citizens questioning the statewide effort to fluoridate the water. “You’re not going to convince some of them. They work on emotion, not science,” says Mouden, who earned his doctor of dental surgery at the University of Missouri-Kansas City in 1975 and his master’s in health policy and administration from Carolina in 1994. Instead, Mouden and his four-person staff have concentrated on crisscrossing the state, meeting with local officials, one community at a time. In fact, he says he’s been to more city council meetings than he can remember. But the work is paying off. Local water system participation was at 49 percent when he arrived. It’s now at 64 percent and getting closer all the time to the 75 percent goal.

spring 2008

Mouden’s accomplishments look all the more impressive considering he started in Arkansas in 1999 with no budget or staff. Using his savvy political and leadership skills, he aligned himself with supportive legislators who developed and passed a statute requiring the state oral health program. He also built a

Alum spearheads Arkansas’ water fluoridation efforts; founds PANDA program to train dentists worldwide to recognize and report abuse

child abuse and neglect Warning signs: Repeated injuries, or injuries in various stages of healing Inappropriate behavior Neglected appearance or hygiene Parents that are extremely strict or super-critical of the child

General risk factors: History of drug or alcohol abuse within the family Mouden, however, is perhaps best known for a national and international program called PANDA — Prevent Abuse and Neglect through Dental Awareness. PANDA trains dentists and other health professionals to recognize victims of family violence and provide appropriate intervention. “Seventy-five percent of all physical abuse signs occur in the head, neck and mouth areas,” says Mouden. “And yet, less than one percent of dentists were responsible for reporting such abuse.” Mouden’s interest in family violence was

Through his efforts, we have greater awareness, understanding and oral health treatment for those most in need in our state. coalition of 38 organizations and nonprofit groups to advocate for oral health. “All of that has been significant because we’ve been able to continue despite several major budget crises and two departmental reorganizations,” he says.

Know how to recognize

strengthened at UNC while taking courses in the School of Public Health’s executive master’s program. However, it was seeing and reporting actual cases of abuse while he was a practicing dentist in the small Missouri town of Weston that really got his attention.

Severe stress — economic, lifestyle, or as a result of disasters Dr. Lynn Mouden is the founder of the international program, PANDA — Prevent Abuse and Neglect through Dental Awareness. The program trains dentists and other health professionals to recognize victims of family violence and provide appropriate intervention. Mouden is director of the Arkansas Health Department’s Office of Oral Health and holds a master’s in health policy and administration from UNC.

“At one point, I talked to dentists from other towns in the state and asked if they were seeing what I was seeing, and they said they weren’t,” he says. “That got me thinking. Why am I seeing it in Weston and it wasn’t being seen anywhere else?” He discovered that abuse wasn’t really more prevalent in Weston but that dentists in other towns were missing the signs in their young patients. So, joining forces with a dental benefits carrier, Delta Dental of Missouri, Mouden developed the educational material for PANDA and started spreading the word. “I just took it upon myself to make it a personal mission.” Now with 45 state and 12 international programs, PANDA has proven to be the driving force behind dentists and others do-

ing a better job of recognizing and reporting abuse and neglect. “We are truly blessed to have Lynn Mouden’s experience and capabilities as our leader in improving oral health for all Arkansans,” says Ed Choate, president and chief executive officer of Delta Dental of Arkansas. “Through his efforts, we have greater awareness, understanding and oral health treatment for those most in need in our state.” There’s no slowing this high achiever. Mouden has continued to expand the PANDA program, both in the United States and abroad, and to promote a “train the trainers” component to the program that he developed largely during his annual leave time. Mouden says it’s worth it, knowing he’s helped save lives. n – B y G e n e P i nd e r

Lack of a support network or isolation (e.g., single parent families, few close friends, no relatives nearby, geographic isolation, inability to or fear of interacting with neighbors) Other forms of family violence within the home (spousal or partner abuse, abuse or neglect of elders) History of a parent having been abused as a child

If you suspect a child is being abused or neglected, call the child protective services or law enforcement agency in your area. Remember — reporting is not an accusation. It is a call for help. For more information, visit www.healthyarkansas.com/Oral_ Health/panda/panda_index.htm, or contact Dr. Lynn Mouden at lynn.mouden@arkansas.gov or 501-661-2595. – © D r . L y nn Moud e n

c a r o l i n a p u b l i c h e a lt h

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p u b l i c h e a lt h l e a d e r s : ly n n m o u d e n

Putting Teeth in Public Health D

r. Lynn Mouden has been called a communist, fascist and even the minion of the devil.

That’s on a good day.

spring 2008

Alum spearheads Arkansas’ water fluoridation efforts; founds PANDA program to train dentists worldwide to recognize and report abuse

Know how to recognize

c a r o l i n a p u b l i c h e a lt h

features & news

A Way with Water:

UNC alum dedicates career to helping create water

P hoto b y M i gu e l Escud e r o

p u b l i c h e a lt h l e a d e r s : a l f o n s o z ava l a

and sanitation systems in rural developing country communities Alfonso Zavala

lfonso Zavala’s career in water and sanitation development has taken him to rural villages all over the world where he has done what he does best — help people help themselves.

“I was always very interested in providing water supply systems to low-income populations, especially in rural areas where they had nothing,” says 79-year-old Zavala, a Peruvian native who earned his master’s degree in sanitary engineering at Carolina in 1955 on a fellowship from the International Cooperation Administration — the precursor to the U.S. Agency for International Development. Zavala’s 40-plus year career has included many opportunities to help. After completing his degree, he went on to oversee the development of the first water and sewer system in Sicaya, Peru — a mountainous city of 4,500. Hired by the Peruvian Minister of Health through the Inter-American Co-operative Service of Public Health, Zavala worked with community members to help them develop

spring 2008

a plan to pay 10 percent of total project costs through cash and labor contributions. “The idea was to organize the community so they could help themselves,” says Zavala, who now lives in McLean, Va. “They provided non-specialized labor and money

Latin America and the Caribbean. John Kalbermatten, who directed the division at that time, remembers Zavala as being particularly good in relationships with World Bank borrowers. “He was a splendid negotiator,” Kalbermatten says. “He could sit down with people at any level of the hierarchy and explain his case — explain why projects were formulated the way they were and why some things were necessary to lead to success. “It’s always a difficult thing to convince developing country officials that water sanitation systems have to be paid for by the people who will be the beneficiaries, even though they may not have much money to make a payment,” Kalbermatten says. “Any system that’s not sustainable by the people who will use it, will eventually fail. This is a concept that is sometimes hard for government officials to accept. You have to make a real good case and have to have the personality to find compromises.” In 1976, Zavala was promoted to chief of the Water Supply and Sanitation Division for Latin America and the Caribbean. Under

his direction, the program averaged five new water supply and sanitation projects annually and had an active portfolio of more than 30 projects under construction in the region at any given time. In 1981, Zavala’s successful leadership led him to be tapped once again for a position of responsibility — this time by Peruvian President Fernando Belaúnde. His new job? Reorganize Peru’s water and sanitation system. Under his direction, Peru’s National Water Supply and Sanitation Corporation (SENAPA) was established, with Zavala as the organization’s first chairman of the board and chief executive officer. “The company was self-sustaining and financially independent,” explains Zavala. “Each person paid for water supply in their community.” Zavala returned to the World Bank in 1983 and ultimately became adviser to water supply and sanitation at the Bank’s Central Projects Office. In this position, he supervised water and sanitation projects funded by the Bank throughout the world. He retired from the World Bank in 1991 but has

continued working as a consultant and adviser on water supply and sanitation-related issues, primarily in Latin America. “I loved what I did as a professional,” Zavala says. “I have really enjoyed helping people have good water supply and sanitation systems that can improve their health and wellbeing. It has been a privilege and a source of tremendous satisfaction to have acquired the knowledge and foundation for my career at the UNC School of Public Health, which in turn gave me the ability to help change so many people’s lives in Peru and other developing countries around the world.” n – B y E m i l y J . S m i th

Alfonso Zavala (right) shakes hands with Javier Velarde, Peru’s former Minister of Housing, during Zavala’s 1981 appointment as president of the National Water Supply and Sewerage Services of Peru. Zavala, a native of Peru, earned a master’s in sanitary engineering from UNC in 1955.

1962 and 1969, through this program, Zavala directed the construction of more than 700 new water supply systems in rural Peruvian communities with populations of 2,000 or less. Each system was built with community participation. Water supply and sanitation administrative boards were formed in each community to oversee the system’s operation and maintenance. Tariffs were collected for water so systems would be sustainable. During this time, Zavala also served as part-time professor at the School of Sanitary Engineering in Lima, Peru’s National Uni-

I have really enjoyed helping people have good water supply and sanitation systems that can improve their health and wellbeing. to show they were interested in having a water system.” The project’s success became a model for other rural water projects throughout Latin America and led to the creation of Peru’s National Rural Water Supply Program, founded by Zavala. Between

versity of Engineering. In 1969, he became dean of the School of Sanitary Engineering and a full-time professor, positions he maintained until 1973 when he joined the World Bank as senior sanitary engineer for the Water Supply and Sanitation Division for c a r o l i n a p u b l i c h e a lt h

features & news

A Way with Water:

UNC alum dedicates career to helping create water

P hoto b y M i gu e l Escud e r o

p u b l i c h e a lt h l e a d e r s : a l f o n s o z ava l a

and sanitation systems in rural developing country communities Alfonso Zavala

lfonso Zavala’s career in water and sanitation development has taken him to rural villages all over the world where he has done what he does best — help people help themselves.

spring 2008

features & news

p u b l i c h e a lt h l e a d e r s : h e at h e r m u n r o e - b lu m

Success is a team effort

Advises first female principal of Montreal’s McGill University

Dr. Heather Munroe-Blum

hen UNC School of Public Health alumna Dr. Heather Munroe-Blum talks about leadership, she speaks of “team effort,” “principles,” and “new possibility.”

“Look for people who bring different things to the table than you do,” she advises young leaders. “Bring together people who add experience that you don’t have, but who share your values and principles, your sense of where you’re going and of new possibility. Success is a team effort. I believe you’ll always have a smarter plan working with others than thinking it through by yourself.” Aspiring leaders may want to heed this advice. Munroe-Blum knows a thing or two about the topic. As the 16th principal and vice-chancellor of McGill University in Montreal and the first woman to hold the position, Munroe-Blum, 57, has been holding leadership positions for the better part of her career. In 2003, she was awarded Canada’s highest civilian honor by being named an Officer of the Order of Canada and cited as one of

spring 2008

the country’s “most influential spokespersons for universities in matters of research strategy and policy.” Prior to accepting the position of principal and vice-chancellor at McGill, she served at the University of Toronto as professor, governor, dean of social work and finally as vice-president of research and international relations. Earlier in her career, she was clinician, lecturer and assistant professor in the Departments of Psychiatry and Clinical Epidemiology and Biostatistics at McMaster University in Hamilton, Ontario, and before that, at York University in Toronto. On May 10, Munroe-Blum, who holds a PhD in epidemiology from Carolina’s School of Public Health, will give the commencement address for the School’s graduation ceremony at 5 p.m. in Memorial Hall on the UNC campus.

When asked about Carolina, MunroeBlum says, “I chose to come to UNC-Chapel Hill because it had the first-ranked epidemiology program in the world in 1978–79. The quality of the graduate education and doctoral program at Chapel Hill remains today a gold standard for what graduate education should be.” The supportive mentoring Munroe-Blum received at Carolina had lasting impact on her, she says. “The best thing that a great teacher and great educational experience can give to a student is to help them see talent and possibility in themselves that they would otherwise not see,” she says. “Dr. Bert Kaplan, my doctoral supervisor, did that for me. He said, ‘You’re going to be president of a university some day.’ His philosophy was that he was learning as much from us (the students) as we were learning from him. I have tried to practice this in every role I’ve been in ever since, with everyone I interact with.” Kaplan, professor emeritus of epidemiology at Carolina, describes Munroe-Blum as “a natural leader, distinguished scholar and eloquent teacher.”

“I’ve been blessed with great students, and she’s one,” he says. “Heather knows herself and knows how to be prepared. She is very creative. She brings her unique gifts to all relationships and responsibilities. She is an exceptional leader who is sensitive to others’ feelings and needs.” Munroe-Blum’s character may have been developed, in part, by a challenging childhood. Her mother was left to care for her and her older brother alone shortly after her birth in Montreal. At age 3, after some time in foster care with her brother, MunroeBlum contracted polio and had to be placed on an iron lung. Doctors were unsure if she would walk again. With the help of a family friend, Munroe-Blum’s mother arranged for her to live with and receive physical therapy from a retired British physiotherapist. The therapy was contrary to the prescribed treatment of the times which advocated bed rest. But when Munroe-Blum came home just before her fourth birthday, she was able to walk with braces, and later fully recovered. Married for 37 years to screenwriter

Leonard Blum, Munroe-Blum and her husband have a 22-year-old daughter, Sydney, an environmental economics master’s student at the University of Edinburgh in Scotland. Munroe-Blum is passionate when speaking about the role that universities play in the development of communities. “Universities fuel our social, cultural and economic institutions, and they help design the shape of our communities,” she said in a speech at her installation as principal of McGill in 2003. “Universities promote the free exchange of ideas and encourage open and meaningful debate. The health of democratic society, our society, depends on that debate and exchange. Universities wrestle with our most difficult problems, and formulate solutions to dilemmas across the spectrum of human activity: Who controls the media? How do we sustain a life-giving environment? What is the role of the free market? How can we cure cancer? Universities have become the defining institutions of modern life — because universities devote themselves to finding deeper definitions,

Dr. Heather Munroe-Blum, the first woman to hold the position of principal and vice-chancellor of McGill University in Montreal, speaks to students on McGill’s campus. Munroe-Blum is a graduate of UNC-Chapel Hill’s doctoral epidemiology program.

deeper meanings and deeper resolutions.” When speaking about the way education can change lives, Munroe-Blum is equally passionate. It’s a topic that has affected her in a personal way. Her mother, Dorothy, won a scholarship to McGill years ago — an honor that her Irish Catholic immigrant father did not allow her to accept. “She was an extremely bright woman who thought that education was a powerful vehicle for transforming lives,” Munroe-Blum says. “She never did go to university because that’s not what women did then, in her circumstances. Her father was very traditional. She went to secretary school instead. By being at McGill now, I take great satisfaction in some completion of that cycle on her behalf.” n – B y E m i l y J . S m i th c a r o l i n a p u b l i c h e a lt h

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p u b l i c h e a lt h l e a d e r s : h e at h e r m u n r o e - b lu m

Success is a team effort

Advises first female principal of Montreal’s McGill University

Dr. Heather Munroe-Blum

hen UNC School of Public Health alumna Dr. Heather Munroe-Blum talks about leadership, she speaks of “team effort,” “principles,” and “new possibility.”

spring 2008

p u b l i c h e a lt h l e a d e r s : a n n e t h o m a s

P UBLIC h e a l t h l e a d e r s : f i o r e l l a h A o rr tni a c -l g e uNear m ra e

Let’s change the question:

Dare County health director

What are your dreams?

“identifies the win-win and works to that end”

t ’s an age - old curiosity : one person bor n into poverty falls pr ey to his circumstances ; another becomes a success and

inspir ation .

A in

Da r e C ou nt y D epa rtment of P ublic H e a lth since 1996, A n ne Thom as h as been m a k ing ch a nge h a ppen her orga niz ation a nd commu nit y for ov er a deca de . s dir ector of

Those changes have been fundamental (transforming the perception of public health in her community), instrumental (improving the culture in the health department itself), and revolutionary (working with a range of partners to implement program after program to improve health). A major challenge for Thomas has been the overdoses and other substance abuse concerns that have plagued Dare County recently. In 2006, at a community meeting about the issue attended by then N.C. Secretary of Health and Human Services Carmen Hooker-Odom, State Senate President Marc Basnight, and Dare County human service agency directors, school administrators, and business and religious leaders, Thomas galvanized the community’s resolve to address the problem and was tapped to lead development of a substance abuse plan for the county. She began by convening partners from state and local public health communities to develop a vision for the plan. Under her guidance, they assessed the need and detailed

spring 2008

the necessary resources, timeline, cost of implementation, and funding sources for a substance abuse continuum-of-care demonstration project in the county. It worked. Based on this work, the state and county allocated $1.4 million for a prevention, professional development and treatment services program which began in January 2007. Always looking to learn more, Thomas is a graduate of the School’s Management Academy for Public Health and Southeast

Anne Thomas Anne Thomas, director of Dare County (N.C.) Department of Public Health, is a graduate of the School’s Management Academy for Public Health and the Southeast Public Health Leadership Institute.

with reputations for being closed and unwelcoming, she identifies the win-win and works to that end. Most important, Anne communicates honestly and directly what others are afraid to say, and she is heard,

Anne sees where we are and where we need to go, and she gets us there. Public Health Leadership Institute. (See page 7.) Ellie Ward, nursing director for Dare County’s Department of Public Health, explains Thomas’ inspirational nature. “Anne sees where we are and where we need to go, and she gets us there,” Ward says. “With partners, even competitors or those

because she seeks to understand and solve, not judge or blame.” In creating the substance abuse program, Thomas tackled a complex and emotionallycharged issue and succeeded in developing a comprehensive plan to serve her community now and in the future. n – B y Ann e M e nk e ns

What

P hoto b y M a x w e ll S . G u e r r a

features & news

causes a life to follow one path or another ?

Fiorella Horna-Guerra would answer, Work, hope and a miracle or two. Currently serving as consultant to the North Carolina Farmworker Health Program in the N.C. Department of Health and Human Services’ Office of Rural Health and Community Care, Horna-Guerra knows first-hand about her clients’ circumstances. When she was five years old, her family moved from Lima, Peru, to New York City in search of a new beginning. Two months later, her father returned to Peru, with no explanation, leaving behind his wife and young daughter in a country where they knew little about the language and customs. Horna-Guerra’s mother, whose most marketable job skill was sewing, grew up in an era when women in Peru were not encouraged to go to school. Still, says Horna-Guerra, her mother’s faith, love for learning, work ethic, independence and resilience allowed them to live a productive and secure life. Horna-Guerra has spent her adult life giving back. A 2006 graduate of Carolina’s Emerging Leaders in Public Health Program, a program of the North Carolina Institute for Public Health (see page 7), Horna-Guerra says that early in her career as community

outreach coordinator in a Medicaid managed care plan for Metropolitan Hospital in New York and through her work at the Manhattan Borough President’s office, she often found herself influencing legislation and advocating for expanded funding for health-based programs. In 1993, when she moved to Cary, N.C., she was hired as program manager for the Community-based Public Health Initiative at the Lee County Health Department in Sanford, N.C. “You’re not from around here, are you?” is the question she remembers hearing most often. Her colleagues wondered if a feisty, 5-foot-1-inch Latina could work with the primarily African American population they served. People she tried to help thought she talked too fast and had “big-city” ways. Horna-Guerra says she had to learn to be an advocate and educator as well as a mover and shaker. “I served as a resource to people as they empowered themselves to look for the services they needed. And I had to talk a lot slower,” she says. Dr. John Hatch, Kenan Distinguished Professor Emeritus of health behavior and health education, was one of Horna-Guerra’s mentors. “Don’t just ask people what they need,” she remembers Hatch telling her.

Fiorella Horna-Guerra

“Let’s change the question. Ask them what their dreams are.” Horna-Guerra says she got surprising responses to that question. Rather than focus on what people lacked, she says she found ways to identify their strengths, inborn talents and assets to help them attain their goals and access services. She’s continuing to do that today. “North Carolina is different from New York in many ways — not the least of which is the number of uninsured, working poor. People here may be overlooked for various reasons and thus experience limited access to getting their needs met. “It’s one of the things that I’m working on changing,” she says with a grin. n — B y L i nd a K a stl e m a n Fiorella Horna-Guerra is a consultant to the North Carolina Farmworker Health Program in the N.C. Department of Health and Human Services’ Office of Rural Health and Community Care. She is a 2006 graduate of the School’s Emerging Leaders in Public Health Program. c a r o l i n a p u b l i c h e a lt h

p u b l i c h e a lt h l e a d e r s : a n n e t h o m a s

P UBLIC h e a l t h l e a d e r s : f i o r e l l a h A o rr tni a c -l g e uNear m ra e

Let’s change the question:

Dare County health director

What are your dreams?

“identifies the win-win and works to that end”

t ’s an age - old curiosity : one person bor n into poverty falls pr ey to his circumstances ; another becomes a success and

inspir ation .

A in

Da r e C ou nt y D epa rtment of P ublic H e a lth since 1996, A n ne Thom as h as been m a k ing ch a nge h a ppen her orga niz ation a nd commu nit y for ov er a deca de . s dir ector of

spring 2008

What

P hoto b y M a x w e ll S . G u e r r a

features & news

causes a life to follow one path or another ?

Fiorella Horna-Guerra

features & news

p u b l i c h e a lt h l e a d e r s : g eo r g e w i l l i a m s

Vice president at Amgen, Inc. says

connections made at Carolina continue

G eorge Willi a ms was wor k ing as a statistici a n at the N ationa l I nstitu te of M en ta l H e a lth in the 1960 s , he beca me inter ested in the a pplication of statistics to public he a lth problems . A “ n umbers m a n ,” w ith degr ees in both m athem atics a nd statistics , W illi a ms wa nted to a dd a medica l component to his aca demic discipline . S o in 1970, he ca me to C a ro lina’s S chool of P ublic H e a lth to get a P h D in biostatistics . hen

Now, with almost four decades of leadership experience under his belt, Williams continues to credit his time in Chapel Hill for his success. “There is no doubt in my

academic sector as a biostatistics professor at the University of Michigan. Today Williams continues to collaborate with people he met while a student at Caro-

A lot of the things I’ve done were nurtured by the excitement and enthusiasm I saw from my days at Carolina. mind how impactful UNC has been to my career,” he says. “From the educational component to the breadth and quality of research that I was able to consider… a lot of the things I’ve done were nurtured by the excitement and enthusiasm I saw from my days at Carolina.” Williams is vice president of Global Biomedical Data Sciences at Amgen, Inc., a global biotechnology company that discovers, develops, manufactures and markets human therapeutics based on advances in cellular and molecular biology. Previously he worked in various leadership positions at Merck & Co., Inc., and Bristol-Myers Squibb. He also spent almost a decade in the Dr. George Williams is vice president of Global Biomedical Data Sciences at Amgen, Inc., a global biotechnology company that discovers, develops, manufactures and markets human therapeutics based on advances in cellular and molecular biology. He earned his PhD in biostatistics from Carolina.

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lina. He says one of the best things about going to Carolina is the connections that continue beyond the classroom. “It’s not just the experience you have while you’re on campus. It’s also the opportunity to interact with faculty and students in various ways over the course of a long-term career,” he says. “Even now, I continue to benefit from their wisdom.” n – B y M a r g a r i t a D e P a no

p u b l i c h e a lt h l e a d e r s : t h o m a s r i c k e t t s

When Ricketts talks, the N.C. General Assembly listens W

hen Thomas Ricketts came back to North Carolina in search of a job in medical journalism, he didn’t know that years later, he would influence government decisions on health policy and administration in the state. “One of the first stories I ever did for a local newspaper in Chapel Hill was about rural health policy in North Carolina. I didn’t know at that time, but that should have told me something,” says Ricketts, who earned a bachelor’s in history from Carolina as a Morehead Scholar and worked as production and design manager at the Washington (D.C.) Monthly before returning to the Tar Heel state. Ricketts is now professor of health policy at Carolina’s School of Public Health and director of the North Carolina Rural Health Research Program at UNC. He also is chairman of the Scientific Advisory Committee for United Health Foundation’s annual review, “America’s Health Rankings: A Call to Action for People and Their Communities.” UNC’s

School of Public Health is the academic partner to the review, which also is sponsored by the American Public Health Association and the Partnership for Prevention. Ricketts says he started his public health

Dr. Thomas Ricketts

academic pursuits and passion for health care administration have led him on a journey punctuated by degrees, awards and national recognition. He earned his doctorate in health policy from the School in 1988. He speaks

Tom is very creative in terms of thinking about how delivery of health care relates to the work force supply. career writing proposals for the North Carolina Heart Association. Goaded by a need to know more about how the system worked, he decided, in 1976, to pursue a master’s in health policy at the UNC School of Public Health. Since then, his

French and Russian and, as a side note, is an avid bicyclist who has successfully completed amateur stages of the Tour de France. These days, as director of the North Carolina Rural Health Research Program in the UNC Cecil G. Sheps Center for Health Serc a r o l i n a p u b l i c h e a lt h

features & news

p u b l i c h e a lt h l e a d e r s : g eo r g e w i l l i a m s

Vice president at Amgen, Inc. says

connections made at Carolina continue

Now, with almost four decades of leadership experience under his belt, Williams continues to credit his time in Chapel Hill for his success. “There is no doubt in my

academic sector as a biostatistics professor at the University of Michigan. Today Williams continues to collaborate with people he met while a student at Caro-

spring 2008

p u b l i c h e a lt h l e a d e r s : t h o m a s r i c k e t t s

When Ricketts talks, the N.C. General Assembly listens W

Dr. Thomas Ricketts

p u b l i c h e a lt h l e a d e r s : t h o m a s r i c k e t t s

vices Research, his research focus is the study of North Carolina’s health care work force distribution and its effect on access to care and the health status of North Carolinians. “We have recently anticipated shortages of allied health workers, doctors and dentists, and when we issue a warning that such a thing is about to happen, usually the General Assembly of North Carolina pays attention,” says Ricketts, who is also the Sheps Center deputy director. “Tom is very creative in terms of thinking about how delivery of health care relates to the work force supply,” notes Sheps Center Director Dr. Tim Carey, who has known him for more than 20 years. As head of the Health Policy Analysis Unit at the Sheps Center, Ricketts also works at the federal level advising the U.S. Secretary of Health and Human Services on health policy issues. He is editor-in-chief of the North Carolina Medical Journal and also serves on advisory committees of the Association of American Medical Colleges

and AcademyHealth. “If there’s a complex health care policy issue, I’d want to turn to Tom rather than anyone else. He’s an innovative and creative thinker,” says Dr. Peggy Leatt, chair of the School’s Department of Health Policy and Administration, who has worked with Ricketts since 2002. Recently, Ricketts has been working with French researchers to develop a new, U.S.-style school of public health with campuses in Paris and Rennes. He is involved in planning and teaching at the Ecole des Hautes Etudes en Sante Publique and hopes the affiliation will result in knowledge transfer between UNC and this emerging academic institution. “I’m hoping that our students and faculty can spend some time working there,” he says. “The EU has set a goal of making Europe the leader in the knowledge-based economies. The United States needs to respond to that, but we also need to know how we can learn from each other.” n – B y P r a sh a nt N a i r , P h D

p u b l i c h e a lt h l e a d e r s

Leaders continued from page 6

Greenberg continued from page 17

8 The leaders profiled in this issue tell us that success does not come from one person’s efforts and abilities alone, but from their ability to inspire others to work with them, and with each other. Working together — as a team — is a theme that other UNC greats have emphasized. When Michael Jordan was a UNC freshman — long before he became a superstar athlete — his coach, Dean Smith, told him, “Michael, if you can’t pass, you can’t play.” Smith, one of the most successful coaches in college basketball history, helped his players develop their skills by giving them the same three goals every year, as chronicled in his book, The Carolina Way: Play Hard: Insist on consistent effort. Play Smart: Execute properly. Understand and execute the fundamentals. Play Together: Play unselfishly. Don’t focus on individual statistics.

8 Especially in universities, where there is a hierarchy, most of what gets done is more by personal persuasion. A lot has to do with creating enough excitement, enough enthusiasm that other people voluntarily subscribe.” Shortly after HSSC got underway in 2004, South Carolina Governor Mark Sanford awarded Greenberg the Order of the Palmetto, the state’s highest civilian honor, for exceptional service to the state and nation. “During your time as its president, MUSC has enjoyed national recognition in the areas of education, research and patient care,” Sanford said at the time. Still to come, the governor predicted, were even greater achievements, “whose seeds have been planted through your efforts to build alliances with health and educational institutions, both public and private, through the state of South Carolina.” In building these alliances, Greenberg has drawn on the examples of his parents, whom he calls one of the greatest blessings of his life. His father, the late Dr. Bernard Greenberg, founded and chaired the Department of Biostatistics in the UNC School of Public Health and later served as dean. His mother, Ruth Greenberg, has a graduate degree in chemistry from Yale. She says her son was a very determined and intelligent person from the time he was very young. In retrospect, his ending up in public health may seem pre-ordained, but he insists he had no clue as a Carolina undergraduate or in medical school at Duke that he would take that route. While doing a master’s in public health at Harvard, he developed a passion for epidemiology, which led him back to the Carolina School of Public Health for a PhD in that field. But he started to develop much earlier the leadership skills he relies on today. “From my earliest memories, I was always around academic people, and it always felt very comfortable to me to interact and understand the culture and the values that make you successful in an academic setting,” he says. “A lot of that I just absorbed growing up. It’s hard to say whether I inherited it or

aspire

facilitate

cooporate

Dr. Thomas Ricketts, (left) professor of health policy at UNC-Chapel Hill, is an avid bicyclist who has successfully completed amateur stages of the Tour de France. As director of the N.C. Rural Health Research Program, Ricketts’ research focus is the study of North Carolina’s health care work force distribution and its effect on access to care and the health status of North Carolinians.

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Perhaps the strongest definition of leadership that emerged from our research was that leaders who lead by example are inspiring. “I think the one true form of leadership is leadership by example,” says Dr. James Porto, clinical assistant professor of health policy and administration and director of the School’s Executive Master’s Program. “You don’t become a leader by holding a certain position — leadership has to be earned. And it starts with ‘self-leadership,’ which is self-discipline and self-management. That’s manifested by success, but also by how a person handles failure. Socrates summed it up — ‘Know thyself!’” So read on about our alumni, faculty and students in this issue of Carolina Public Health. We hope you’ll be as inspired by these stories of leadership as we are. n – B y R a m on a D u B os e

P hoto b y Roo W ay

features & news

Weedon continued from page 19

acquired it being Bernie Greenberg’s son.” He took away some specific lessons from his father’s experience as dean during the turbulent early 1970s, when there was much anti-establishment sentiment. He said of his father, “He worked very hard during this time to be perceived for his true values, for promoting equal opportunity, for helping the underserved population.” “Especially where there are differences of opinion or emotional issues, solutions are not quick,” he says he came to understand. “You have to be persistent and consistent. You have to listen a lot. It’s important for people to be heard and to allow them to feel they’re engaged in the decision-making.” Ray Greenberg took the lesson to heart. Colleagues like Larry Mohr say he is a leader who lets people know he’s heard them. “He has done a remarkable job in putting together very creative collaborations that have really had a multiplier effect, a synergistic effect in enhancing the effectiveness of what we’re doing here,” Mohr says. “We don’t have a lot of advantages in South Carolina,” Greenberg says. “But our recent ability to partner effectively — I hope that will be an important legacy.” n

8 “The two real professional loves of my life are veterinary medicine and education. Nothing gives me more pleasure than to see a student ‘get it,’” he says, adding that he’s been thrilled to see his students go on to experience success in the veterinary and public health fields. Weedon was appointed to New Hanover County’s Board of Health in January 2005 — while still completing his MPH — and in 2007 was elected vice chairman. He is also a 2007 graduate of the Southeast Public Health Leadership Institute, a program administered by the School’s North Carolina Institute for Public Health (see page 7). Weedon and McNeil now organize an annual public health forum for the local veterinarian community on specific issues like rabies awareness. Most recently, he has spearheaded an effort to monitor the quality of the county’s water supply, an endeavor involving the New Hanover County Health Department, the County Commissioners, and UNCWilmington. “We’ve ruffled some feathers,” he admits. “Learning how to play the political game has been an important aspect of my education, because you may know how you think it should be done, you may know how you want to do it, but getting elected officials to see what you see can be a challenge.” Weedon foresees many more opportunities for leadership, given his particular interests and skills developed through the four separate UNC School of Public Health programs he’s completed. “Of the top eight infectious bioterrorism agents,” he notes, “seven of them are zoonotic diseases (transmitted between animals and people) — bird flu, tuberculosis, West Nile virus, anthrax, botulism, Ebola and plague. “This illustrates the importance of veterinary medicine being involved in the public health community,” he says. “Ultimately, I’d like to finish my career doing something at the state or federal level, perhaps in policy development or bioterrorism preparedness — something that would impact a larger section of the population. When the right thing comes along, I’ll know it, and I’ll jump on it.” n

– B y K a thl e e n K e a r ns

– B y P a ul F r e ll i ck

Dr. Raymond Greenberg

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Leaders continued from page 6

Greenberg continued from page 17

aspire

facilitate

cooporate

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Weedon continued from page 19

– B y K a thl e e n K e a r ns

– B y P a ul F r e ll i ck

Dr. Raymond Greenberg

c a r o l i n a p u b l i c h e a lt h

features & news

ASC r tHiOOL cle N NE aW me S

SCHOOL N E WS First ‘Global Obesity Business Forum’ convenes at UNC-Chapel Hill Senior executives from 14 major global food and beverage companies participate

Caribbean Health Leadership Institute to launch this June The UNC S chool

S enior food industry ex ecuti ves and leading international nutrition scientists and medical experts convened Oct. 29–30, 2007, at UNC-Chapel Hill for the first Global Obesity Business Forum to discuss solutions to one of today’s most dangerous global health issues — obesity. The forum is an initiative of the UNC-Chapel Hill Interdisciplinary Obesity Center (IDOC). “A large number of countries, as well as most major global food companies, are grappling with ways to address this major global problem,” says Dr. Barry Popkin, director of IDOC and Distinguished Professor of global nutrition in the UNC Schools of Public Health and Medicine who specializes in studies of the dynamic shifts in diet, activity, and obesity occurring across the globe. “Ways to create a common playing field to promote healthier diets include a vast array of regulatory, taxation and labeling approaches,” Popkin says. “We know that around the world, people prefer sweet, fatty and delicious foods and drinks. The question is how to make those foods generally healthy and how to reduce caloric intake to address the large increases in obesity and diabetes seen globally.” The forum combined scholarly research related to obesity with corporate case studies and proposed roadmaps for action. Short

spring 2008

Dr. Barry Popkin

presentations and in-depth group discussions were held on several key areas related to caloric and noncaloric sweeteners and fats. For more information on the forum, visit http://www.cpc.unc.edu/idoc/gobf. n The event was chaired by Henry J. (Hank) Cardello, a former executive with CocaCola, RJR Nabisco, and General Mills, who serves as the forum’s industry executive partner. Corporate participants included senior vice presidents and other senior executives from most major global food and beverage companies, including Cadbury Schweppes, Campbell Soup Co., CocaCola, Danone, General Mills, Hershey Co., Kellogg’s, Kraft Foods, Nestlé, McDonald’s, Mead Johnson Nutritionals, Starbucks, Unilever and Wyeth Nutrition.

P ublic H ea lth ’s

North Carolina Institute for Public Health is collaborating with the University of the West Indies to create the Caribbean Health Leadership Institute — a five-year, $2 million initiative to enhance health leadership and management capacity in the Caribbean and fight the HIV/AIDS epidemic in the region. The rate of HIV infection in the Caribbean is the second highest in the world, after Africa, according to United Nations figures, with an estimated 230,000 people in the Caribbean living with the disease. An estimated 11,000 people in the Caribbean died of AIDS in 2007, and AIDS remains a leading cause of death among people ages 25 to 44. The new Institute — funded by the Global AIDS Program at the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) — will use onsite and distance learning activities, individual assessment and coaching, team projects, and a competency-based curriculum to train public health leaders in ways to improve regional HIV/AIDS programs. The program is scheduled to launch on June 2, 2008, in Jamaica, when 25 participants from across the English-speaking countries of the Caribbean will begin their training. The N.C. Institute for Public Health (NCIPH) is providing consultation and technical assistance to staff at the University of the West Indies (UWI) to design, conduct and evaluate the new program. UWI staff spent several days in Chapel Hill, N.C., in

December 2007, working on program design with staff from both NCIPH and the Center for Creative Leadership — a Greensboro, N.C.-based leadership development organization. In February, three UWI staffers completed a two-week “train-the-trainer” session in Greensboro, titled “Leading Across Boundaries.” The session brought together individuals from Africa, India and the Caribbean who work in leadership development roles. Dr. Brendan Bain will direct the new Institute. Bain is professor of community health at the UWI, lead coordinator for the University’s HIV/AIDS Response Program and regional director of the Caribbean HIV/ AIDS Regional Training Network. n

The University Cancer Research Fund: North Carolina Arms Researchers for the Battle E sta blished

by the

N orth C a rolina

General Assembly last July, the University Cancer Research Fund (UCRF) was created to accelerate the battle against cancer in North Carolina. Well into its first year, the UCRF is shaping a range of cancer initiatives at UNC, many of which will transfer to communities across North Carolina. “Cancer control is a public health issue,” says UNC School of Public Health Dean Barbara K. Rimer, a member of the UCRF Governance Committee. “The University Cancer Research Fund is tangible evidence that our legislature is committed to th Thursday, September 25 , 2008 invest substantial resources in preventing cancer, find6:30 p.m. ing it early and treating it Wo r l d o f D i f f e r e n c e D i n n e r optimally. Researchers at Honoring current members of The Rosenau Society the UNC School of Public and benefactors of professorships, scholarships, Health are true partners in specialty endowments and facilities these initiatives. I’m also thrilled that some of the Rosenau Society membership levels are: funds will support students Dean’s Circle $1,000 - $1,999 committed to cancer conChancellor’s Circle $2,000 - $4,999 trol research.” President’s Circle $5,000 - $25,000 The fund — established to Gifts for 2007-2008 membership are due prior to accelerate the battle against June 30th, 2008. cancer at UNC-Chapel Hill’s School of Medicine • and its Lineberger CompreFriday, September 26th, 2008 hensive Cancer Center — received $25 million in 11:00 a.m. 2007; $40 million in 2008; N a m i n g C e r e m o n y a n d C e l e b r at i o n and is slated to receive $50 (when we become the UNC Gillings School of million per year beginning Global Public Health) in 2009. A number of faculty at the UNC School of • Public Health hold faculty For more information about these events, appointments at the UNC please contact the Office of External Affairs at Lineberger Comprehensive (919) 966-0198 or jerry_salak@unc.edu. Cancer Center and the UNC School of Medicine.

SAV E T H E DAT ES !

The first year of the UCRF is focused on recruiting faculty and staff; developing leading-edge programs and technology; funding innovative grants to fuel future programs and initiatives; and conducting listening sessions to learn the opinions of North Carolina citizens regarding ways that cancer screening, prevention and treatment can be improved in their communities.

Innovative Research in Labs, Clinics and Communities Dr. Vangie Foshee, associate professor of health behavior and health education at the School of Public Health, received one of 18 Innovation Awards given through the UCRF. She received funding to conduct preliminary studies to determine if contextual factors (i.e., characteristics of the family, peer, school, and neighborhood environments) buffer or exaggerate the influences of genes on the development of adolescent tobacco and alcohol use. Her study will be conducted in two rural counties in North Carolina. Her proposal was reviewed by a team of leading UNC faculty. Foshee’s was one of more than 120 proposals from researchers in nearly 30 departments in the Schools of Public Health, Dentistry, Medicine and Pharmacy, and the College of Arts and Sciences. The team awarded $2 million for the Innovation Awards and $500,000 for eight Clinical Innovation Awards. The Innovation Awards provide “a unique opportunity to support novel, imaginative pilot research projects,” says Dr. Rudy Juliano, professor of pharmacology and chair of the review committee for the awards. “Often such risky work would be difficult to fund by traditional grant mechanisms, but may have the highest potential impact on science, and ultimately on cancer care.” Juliano is principal investigator for the Carolina Center for Nanotechnology Excellence. 8 c a r o l i n a p u b l i c h e a lt h

features & news

ASC r tHiOOL cle N NE aW me S

SCHOOL N E WS First ‘Global Obesity Business Forum’ convenes at UNC-Chapel Hill Senior executives from 14 major global food and beverage companies participate

Caribbean Health Leadership Institute to launch this June The UNC S chool

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Dr. Barry Popkin

P ublic H ea lth ’s

The University Cancer Research Fund: North Carolina Arms Researchers for the Battle E sta blished

by the

N orth C a rolina

SAV E T H E DAT ES !

features & news

ASC r tHiOOL cle N NE aW me S

A key UCRF component involves population scientists who move findings and innovative programs into communities. “The UCRF funds are critical to promote broad community outreach and dissemination of effective programs for cancer prevention and control as well as cancer survivorship,” says Dr. Marci Campbell, professor of nutrition in the UNC School of Public Health and a program leader for population sciences for the UNC Lineberger/UCRF Program Planning Committee. “The funds will support recruitment of additional senior faculty in key areas such as health communication, dissemination and health outcomes

research. Our recent designation as a Lance Armstrong Foundation Center of Excellence in Cancer Survivorship (see page 54) reflects recognition of our strengths in areas such as community interventions to reduce health disparities, a major priority of UCRF.” Dr. Andy Olshan, professor and chair of epidemiology in the UNC School of Public Health and leader of UNC Lineberger’s cancer epidemiology program, notes, “The UCRF has already provided critical support to enhance and develop new important initiatives in population sciences by partnering with the North Carolina Central Cancer Registry to expand its capabilities to capture timely and high-quality data on cancer incidence and mortality in North Carolina.

th a n

600

students , educators

and health professionals from across the nation attended the 29th Annual Minority Health Conference on Feb. 29, 2008, at the William and Ida Friday Center for Continuing Education. Another 1,000 people participated in the event via satellite downlink and webcast, making it the largest minority health conference in the history of the event. “I see this as a testament to the priority that has been placed on minority health and issues impacting people of color,” says Janelle Armstrong-Brown, a doctoral student in health behavior and health education

Che Smith, UNC-Chapel Hill biostatistics doctoral student, and Afabwaje (Afa) Jatau, master’s student in health behavior and health education at UNCChapel Hill, volunteer at the Minority Student Caucus exhibit at the UNC School of Public Health’s Annual Minority Health Conference, held Feb. 29, 2008. The event attracted more than 600 students, educators and health professionals from across the nation. Another 1,000 people participated via satellite downlink and webcast.

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who co-chaired the conference with Eboni Taylor, a PhD student in epidemiology. “We look forward to another successful year and for success many years to come.”

UNC S chool of P ublic H e a lth faculty are collaborating with the Carolina Entrepreneurial Initiative at UNC’s Kenan-Flagler Business School to offer a graduate certificate in entrepreneurship. The new certificate program, which launched this spring, offers graduate students, post-docs and fulltime faculty and staff an opportunity to explore how entrepreneurship is changing their fields and how to conceive, plan and execute new commercial and nonprofit ventures. The program has three tracks: artistic, life sciences and public health entrepre-

– B y D i a nn e S h a w a nd E m i ly J . S m i th

School’s 29th Annual Minority Health Conference attracts record turnout M or e

Graduate certificate in public health entrepreneurship now available

Two new major projects are a cohort study of cancer patients diagnosed and treated at UNC that will provide a tremendous resource for the interdisciplinary examination of survivorship; and an important new study, starting in June 2008, of breast cancer in North Carolina — the Carolina Breast Cancer Study 3. This study will examine the causes and probable outcomes of various types of breast cancer among African American women in North Carolina. The UCRF is funding numerous other collaborations focused on ensuring that North Carolinians get the best possible cancer care. To read in greater depth about the UCRF, visit: www.cancer.unc.edu/ucrf. n

The conference’s 10th Annual William T. Small Jr. Keynote Lecture was given by Dr. Nancy Krieger, professor of society, human development, and health at the Harvard

School of Public Health (HSPH). Her lecture, titled “The Science and Epidemiology of Racism and Health in the United States: an Ecosocial Perspective,” addressed how racial inequalities in social conditions become biologically embodied over lifetimes and across generations, creating racial and ethnic health Dr. Nancy Kreiger inequities. Krieger is associate director of the Harvard Center for Society and Health and co-director of the HSPH Interdisciplinary Concentration on Women, Gender and Health. This year’s conference was made possible by a lead gift from Bodil and George Gellman. Mr. Gellman is a 1969 graduate of UNC’s Department of Economics. This gift is the largest single contribution from individual donors in the 29-year history of the conference. For more information on the conference, visit www.minority.unc.edu/sph/ minconf/2008. n

neurship. Plans are underway for tracks in commercial and social entrepreneurship. The certificate requires completion of a nine-credit-hour course sequence taken in parallel with students’ core degree programs. Dr. Alice Ammerman, professor of nutrition in the UNC Schools of Public Health and Medicine and director of the Center for Health Promotion and Disease Prevention, oversees the certificate’s public health track. For more information, visit www.kenaninstitute. unc.edu/centers/cei. n

photo b y e m i ly fo r d / s a l i sbu r y post

Partnering with North Carolina Communities

David Murdock speaks with UNC School of Public Health student Andrea Nikolai following his February 2007 lecture in a public health entrepreneurship class taught by School of Public Health faculty Drs. Alice Ammerman and Daniel Pomp. Murdock, the sole owner of Dole Food Co. and real estate giant Castle & Cooke, Inc., has financed the N.C. Research Campus in Kannapolis, N.C. A new research building of the Nutrition Research Institute — part of the School of Public Health located on the Kannapolis campus — is due to be open in June, 2008. c a r o l i n a p u b l i c h e a lt h

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who co-chaired the conference with Eboni Taylor, a PhD student in epidemiology. “We look forward to another successful year and for success many years to come.”

– B y D i a nn e S h a w a nd E m i ly J . S m i th

School’s 29th Annual Minority Health Conference attracts record turnout M or e

Graduate certificate in public health entrepreneurship now available

The conference’s 10th Annual William T. Small Jr. Keynote Lecture was given by Dr. Nancy Krieger, professor of society, human development, and health at the Harvard

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Partnering with North Carolina Communities

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School hosts numerous distinguished lectures

umerous distinguished individuals have made notable presentations at the UNC School of Public Health over the past several months. Below are highlights of a few who have shared their experiences and expertise in special lectures at our School. To hear these lectures online, visit www.sph.unc.edu/media/webcasts.html. Dr. Jonathan B. Oberlander, associate professor of health policy and administration at the UNC School of Public Health, presented the 2008 Fred T. Foard Jr. Memorial Lecture on April 14, 2008, at the William and Ida Friday Center for Continuing Education in Chapel Hill. Oberlander is associate professor of social Dr. Jonathan medicine at the UNC Oberlander School of Medicine, adjunct political science associate professor at UNC and research fellow at the UNC Cecil G. Sheps Center for Health Services Research. He is a nationally-recognized expert on health care reform — a major issue in the 2008 presidential race when candidates are being called upon to articulate plans for expanding coverage while controlling costs. To shed light on this issue, Oberlander authored the lead perspectives in the Oct. 25 and Nov. 22 issues of the New England Journal of Medicine. The first article explored why past health reform efforts have failed; the second analyzed the health reform plans of current leading presidential candidates (see www.nejm.org). Michael Neidorff, chairman and chief executive officer of the Centene Corp., a multi-line managed-care company based in St. Louis, lectured at the School on March 17, 2008. The presentation was the inaugural lecture of the School’s Distinguished Visitors Program and was titled “Academic Research

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In Memoriam

Article Name

to Practical Policy: Quality, Cost and Ethical Issues.” Centene provides Medicaid services and other specialty programs to health care organizations in seven states in the northeastern Michael Neidorff and southern United States. Neidorff has guided Centene to a leadership role in its field through marrying progressive business and quality improvement practices with cutting-edge health promotion and disease management programs to serve its clients.

Office of Drug Evaluation, which regulates cardio-renal, neuropharmacologic and psychopharmacologic drugs. Temple has written extensively on the design and conduct of clinical trials. His lecture, titled “FDA Drug Approval Process, Potential Efficiencies and Active Control Trials,” was sponsored by the UNC Center for Innovative Clinical Trials and the School of Public Health. Stephanie Nolen, Africa correspondent for the Globe and Mail, the national newspaper of Canada, spoke movingly about Africa’s AIDS Pandemic at a lecture at the School on Nov. 1, 2007. The presentation, titled “28: Telling the Human Stories Behind Africa’s AIDS Pandemic,” was part of the Dean’s Lecture Series. Nolen is the author of three books — 28: Stories of AIDS in Africa, Promised the Moon: the Untold Story of the First Women in the Space Race and Shakespeare’s Face. At 35, she

Dr. Robert Temple, director of the Office of Medical Policy in the Center for Drug Evaluation and Research at the U.S. Food and Drug Administration, spoke at the School on March 6, 2008. His office is responsible for regulating the promotion of drugs and assessing quality of clinical trials. Temple, a medical doctor, also is acting director of the

Dr. Robert Temple

Stephanie Nolen

is a six-time nominee for Canada’s top reporting prize, the National Newspaper Award, and a back-to-back winner of the International Reporting Award. She was the recipient of the 2003, 2004 and 2006 Amnesty International Award for Human Rights Reporting, for reports from war zones in Uganda and Sudan. She has reported from more than 40 countries around the world. Dr. Sheila Leatherman, research professor of health policy and administration at the UNC School of Public Health, spoke on “Microcredit and Global Health” at a Dean’s Lecture Series presentation on Sept. 24, 2007, at the School. Microcredit is a financial innovation that seeks to address the issue of global poverty. Small loans are extended to the impoverished or unemployed so they can Dr. Sheila Leatherman build independent businesses. Leatherman is researching the impact of microcredit on global health. Leatherman is distinguished associate of Darwin College at the University of Cambridge in England and is the first Gillings Visiting Professor at the UNC School of Public Health. The professorship was established last year with funding from Dennis Gillings, CBE (Commander of the British Empire), and his wife, Joan. Gillings, a former UNC biostatistics professor, is chairman and chief executive officer of Quintiles Transnational Corp. n

Suggest a speaker you would like us to bring to the UNC School of Public Health. Submit your nomination to the School’s Speaker Selection Committee by contacting Jerry Salak at jerry_salak@unc.edu or 919-843-0661. The committee selects speakers for the Dean’s Lecture Series, Commencement, Foard Lecture and other special events.

Tyroler Memorialized for Transformative Influence on Field of Epidemiology

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“The community of Al Tyroler’s former students, colleagues and friends mobilized to celebrate the life of this outstanding public health scientist, mentor and lifelong learner,” says Dr. Gerardo Heiss, Kenan Distinguished Professor of epidemiology at the UNC School of Public Health. “We received moving contributions from many parts of the world, and vivid testimonials were shared by the many who came to speak with affection and gratitude of this wise teacher and brilliant colleague. We were particularly pleased that Al’s family could be at the center of this celebration of his life.” Born Sept. 5, 1924, in Brooklyn, N.Y., Tyroler had a transformative influence on the field of epidemiology. Since the early 1950s, his enthusiasm about epidemiology and de-

Dr. Herman Alfred Tyroler

sire to harness this new discipline to improve the wellbeing of communities contributed to the shaping of cardiovascular epidemiology, its mission and accomplishments. Tyroler graduated Phi Beta Kappa from Ohio University in 1943, received a doctorate in medicine from New York University College of Medicine in 1947, and completed additional medical training at Cornell University, New York Medical College and Metropolitan Hospital in New York City. He served in the U.S. Air Force Medical Corps for two years before being appointed research director of the Occupational Health Services and, soon after, 8 c a r o l i n a p u b l i c h e a lt h

features & news

School hosts numerous distinguished lectures

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In Memoriam

Article Name

Dr. Robert Temple

Stephanie Nolen

Tyroler Memorialized for Transformative Influence on Field of Epidemiology

H er m a n A lfr ed (“A l”)

Ty roler , A lumni D istinguished

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died

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people was held in his on

S ept. 28, 2007.

Dr. Herman Alfred Tyroler

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P hoto b y J e a nn e W a r n e r

8 research director of the Health Research Foundation in Asheville, N.C. In 1960, Tyroler joined the UNC Department of Epidemiology faculty. He became a full professor in 1967 and was named Alumni Distinguished Professor in 1979. His career at UNC spanned more than 40 years, during which he achieved national prominence for his work in the United States and internationally, including long-time consultancy to the World Health Organization and the National Aeronautics and Space Administration. His influential studies in the areas of cardiovascular disease, genetic epidemiology, minority health, women’s health and international health reflect the range of his intellectual curiosity. Tyroler earned election to the Institute of Medicine, National Academy of Sciences. His numerous honors include the American Heart Association’s Distinguished Achievement Award and Ancel Keys Lecture; the American Public Health Association’s John Snow Award; the UNC School of Public Health’s Edward G. McGavran Award for Excellence in Teaching and the Bernard G.

Dr. Al Tyroler, in a photo taken circa 1977

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Greenberg Alumni Endowment Award. As a particularly fitting way to honor Al Tyroler’s life-long dedication to teaching and mentoring, a scholarship was established in his honor at UNC. Donations may be made in Tyroler’s memory with checks to “UNCCH School of Public Health Foundation,

Inc.” referencing “H. A. Tyroler Scholarship” in the memo field. Mail gifts to UNC School of Public Health, P.O. Box 309, Chapel Hill, N.C. 27514-0309. You may give online at www.sph.unc.edu/giving. For more information, contact Stephen Couch at (919) 966-0219 or stephen_couch@unc.edu. n

Michalak Commemor ated for Selfless Service to Public H ealth C r a ig L. M ich a l a k , administrator of the North Carolina Local Health Agency Accreditation Program managed by the North Carolina Institute for Public Health (NCIPH) within the UNC School of Public Health, died on Aug. 20, 2007, after a valiant fight with leukemia. He was 59. Michalak came to UNC in 2005, along with his wife, Sarah, a university librarian and associate provost for university libraries at UNC-Chapel Hill. With an MBA from the University of California at Los Angeles, administrative experience at the University of Utah and the University of California system, and several years in business, Michalak was a perfect fit to establish and administer the state’s first-ever local health agency accreditation program. “Craig was a dear friend and a valued colleague,” says Dr. Edward Baker, NCIPH director. “So many of us benefited from his selfless service to public health in North Carolina and across the nation. Craig creatively built and managed the North Carolina Local Health Agency Accreditation Program, the first such program in the United States. The program he helped build will serve as a

Craig Michalak

lasting legacy to his dedicated service, and it will stand as a model for others across the nation to emulate.” Donations may be made in Michalak’s memory to a fund established in his honor by UNC Libraries. Please make checks out to “University Library,” and write “Craig Michalak Memorial Library Fund” in the memo field. Mail gifts to the Library Development Office, CB # 3900, UNC-Chapel Hill, Chapel Hill, N.C. 27514-8890. For more information, contact Sarah Poteete at (919) 843-5660 or poteete@email.unc.edu. n

Okun R emembered for Pioneering Work in Water Engineering

Da niel A. O ku n , UNC K ena n D istinguished

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Okun was hailed worldwide for his groundbreaking work in identifying pristine water sources, water management, water supply, pollution control, water reclamation and reuse, and watershed protection issues. In 2006, he received lifetime achievement awards from Orange Water and Sewer Authority (OWASA) in Orange County, N.C., the national Environmental and Water Resources Institute and the International Water Association. During his career, Okun worked in 89 countries and consulted with municipal and legislative planning committees throughout the United States. Among Okun’s many contributions, he helped design a water treatment plant in Bangkok, Thailand; establish a graduate program in sanitary engineering in Lima, Peru; and studied water supply and pollution control in China for the World Bank. At home in Chapel Hill, he led the campaign to build Cane Creek Dam and

of en v ironmenta l

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Reservoir in the 1980s to ensure the most pristine water source possible for Chapel Hill and UNC campus. Okun began his career at UNC in 1952 and served as chair of the Department of Environmental Sciences and Engineering from 1955 to 1973. During his time as chair, the department grew from three to 25 faculty members. Although Okun retired from teaching in 1982, he remained actively involved in the profession through writing, lecturing and consulting, until his death. “Dan Okun cared deeply about his school, his community, his state and his world,” says Dean Barbara K. Rimer. “And he turned that commitment into action, through water projects and social action. Few professors have influenced more students, more professionals, or more policy decisions around the world than Dr. Okun. His work has influenced international policy-making for organizations like the World Bank, United Nations and the World Health Organization. There is nowhere I go that people don’t talk about Dan with awe.” Okun was also a generous donor to the UNC School of Public Health. Over the course of his career, he gave generously to the School’s Department of Environmental Sciences and Engineering, including funds to create the Dr. Daniel Okun, in a photo taken circa 1960s

Dr. Daniel Okun

Dan Okun Scholarship Fund. This endowed scholarship is used to recruit and support promising master’s level environmental engineering students. In 2004, he also made donations to augment the Daniel A. Okun Distinguished Professorship in environmental sciences and engineering — an endowed professorship held by Dr. Philip C. Singer and established in 1999 by School faculty, students and alumni to honor Okun. Finally, in 2007, Okun made a gift to name the chair’s suite in the School’s Department of Environmental Sciences and Engineering. Okun’s gifts to UNC were not limited to the School of Public Health. He also made significant gifts for the renovation of Memorial Hall and to the Sonja Haynes Stone Center for Black Culture and History. Donations may be made in Okun’s memory to the Dan Okun Scholarship Fund. Please make checks out to “UNC-CH School of Public Health Foundation, Inc.” and write “Dan Okun Scholarship Fund” in the memo field. Mail gifts to UNC School of Public Health, P.O. Box 309, Chapel Hill, N.C. 27514-0309. You may give online at www. sph.unc.edu/giving. For more information, contact Lyne Gamble at (919) 966-8368 or lyne_gamble@unc.edu. n c a r o l i n a p u b l i c h e a lt h

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P hoto b y J e a nn e W a r n e r

Dr. Al Tyroler, in a photo taken circa 1977

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Craig Michalak

Okun R emembered for Pioneering Work in Water Engineering

Da niel A. O ku n , UNC K ena n D istinguished

U ni v ersit y P rofessor E mer itus

engineering , died

D ec .10, 2007,

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C hapel H ill , N.C. H e

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Dr. Daniel Okun

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For more information on these and many other faculty, student, alumni and staff awards, honors and recognitions, visit www.sph.unc.edu/school/recognitions.

FACU LT Y Dr. Shrikant Bangdiwala, research professor of biostatistics; Dr. Gerardo Heiss, Kenan Distinguished Professor of epidemiology; and Dr. Jay Kaufman, associate professor of epidemiology, were awarded the title of visiting professor by Dr. Giorgio Solimano, dean of the School of Public Health at the University of Chile at Santiago earlier this year. The titles recognize Bangdiwala, Dr. Shrikant Heiss and Kaufman Bangdiwala for their “relevant academic and scientific merits and permanent collaboration with the (University of Chile) faculty.” January 2008 marks the tenth year of Bangdiwala’s collaboration with the School of Public Health at the University of Chile, as coordinator of the International Summer School Program. Other UNC faculty members who have been involved in the effort in addition to Bangdiwala, Heiss and Kaufman include Drs. Ed Davis, Gary Koch and Lisa LaVange (biostatistics). Bangdiwala also was designated a 2008 visiting professor in the Department of Public Health Sciences by the Karolinska Institutet in Stockholm, Sweden.

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Dr. Marci Campbell, professor of nutrition, will direct and serve as principal investigator for the UNC Lineberger Comprehensive Cancer Center’s LIVESTRONG Survivorship Center of Excellence Network program, which addresses the needs of Dr. Marci Campbell the growing number of cancer survivors in the United States. The network is an invitation-only collaborative partnership among the Lance Armstrong Foundation, National Cancer Institute-designated comprehensive care centers at leading institutions nationwide, and their community affiliates. Its mission is to harness the expertise of these centers and affiliates to accelerate progress in meeting the needs of cancer survivors. Lineberger is the eighth network member institution in the nation. Dr. Rosalind Coleman, professor of nutrition in the School of Public Health and professor of pediatrics in the School of Medicine, was named one of the first fellows in

Dr. Rosalind Coleman

the Working on Women in Science program, a campus-wide initiative to foster the advancement of women in science and medicine. Dr. Giselle Corbie-Smith, associate professor of epidemiology in the Schools of Public Health and Medicine, and of social medicine and medicine in the School of Medicine, has been selected as one of the University’s first Faculty Engaged Scholars. The two-year program helps scholars connect their academic work with the needs of communities and apply their skills to make a difference. The Carolina Women’s Leadership Council honored Dr. Jo Anne Earp, professor of health behavior and health education, with a 2008 Faculty Mentoring Award at the Council’s annual meeting in Chapel Hill, N.C., in February 2008. The accolade includes a $5,000 stipend. The award recognizes outstanding faculty who “go the extra mile” to guide, mentor and lead students and/or junior faculty. The 130-member Carolina Women’s Leadership Council is a nationwide network of women committed to supporting the University and students’ educational experiences. Dr. Anita Farel, clinical professor and associate chair for graduate studies in

maternal and child health, has received the Delta Omega Award for Innovative Public Health Curriculum for her course, “Program Assessment in Maternal and Child Health.” Delta Omega is the honorary society for graduate studies in public health. Farel made a presentation about the course at the Delta Omega annual business meeting and exhibited a poster on it at the American Public Health Dr. Anita Farel Association annual conference. Both events were held in Washington, D.C., in November 2007. Dr. Thomas R. (Bob) Konrad, research professor of health policy and administration at the School of Public Health and of social medicine at the School of Medicine, was recognized in connection with WIN A STEP UP, a program designed to promote career development and reduce turnover among nursing assistants in North Carolina’s nursing homes. The program, a partnership between the N.C. Department of Health and Human Services and the University of North Carolina’s Institute on Aging (NCIOA), was selected as one of two finalists for the 2007 Rosalynn Carter Caregiving Award. The award recognizes leadership in implementing innovative and creative partnerships between community organizations and caregiving researchers. Konrad is a senior research fellow at Cecil G. Sheps Center for Health Services Research. Dr. Jonathan Kotch, professor of maternal and child health, received a 2007-2008 competitive Kenan research leave to conduct research in Edinburgh, Scotland, where he will help implement a comprehensive injury prevention plan for Scottish children and youth in spring 2008.

Dr. Jonathan Kotch

Kotch will collaborate with Children in Scotland, a national agency of more than 400 volunteer and nonprofit organizations working to promote the well-being of children and their families.

Kotch also received the Dr. Susan S. Aronson Early Education and Child Care Advocacy Award at the 2007 American Academy of Pediatrics National Conference and Exhibition. He was recognized for his contributions to the field of child care health consultation. Dr. David Leith, professor of environmental sciences and engineering, was awarded the School’s Bernard G. Greenberg Alumni Endowment Award at the School of Public Health’s annual Fred T. Foard Jr. Memorial Lecture in April 2008. The Greenberg Award was established by the Alumni Association to honor Dr. Bernard G. Greenberg, founder and chair of the Department of Biostatistics from 1949 to 1972 and dean of the School from 1972 to 1982. The award, which carries a cash prize of $12,000 a year for three years, is given annually to an outstanding full-time faculty member for excellence in the areas of teaching, research and service.

Sheila Leatherman, honorary Commander of the Most Excellent Order of the British Empire (CBE), has been named the first Gillings Visiting Professor at the UNC School of Public Health. The professorship is part of Carolina Public Health Solutions, a new initiative funded by Dennis and Joan Gillings and dedicated to accelerating public health impact across North Carolina and around the world. As research professor of health policy and administration at the School, Leatherman evaluates and analyzes health care systems around the globe and, in conducting her research, often serves as visiting professor or visiting scholar at other universities and institutions. The Gillings Visiting Professorship will provide the means for her to focus a portion of UNC’s public health research on microcredit and its impact on global health. Dr. Sandra Martin, professor and associate chair for research in the Department of Maternal and Child Health, was named associate dean for research at the UNC School of Public Dr. Sandra Martin Health. An epidemiologist by training, Martin joined the School of Public Health faculty 8

Dr. Herbert B. Peterson, professor and chair in the Department of Maternal and Child Health at the School of Public Health and professor in the Department of Obstetrics and Gynecology at the School of Medicine, was elected to membership in the Institute of Medicine (IOM). Established in 1970 by the National Academy of Sciences, the Institute serves as a national resource for independent, scientifically informed analysis and recommendations on human health issues. Peterson is known nationally and internationally for his work in women’s reproductive health, epidemiology, health policy, and evidence-based decisionmaking. Prior to joining the School of Public Health faculty in 2004, he held various research and administrative positions over the course of 20 years with the World Health Organization, U.S. Public Health Service and the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention.

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For more information on these and many other faculty, student, alumni and staff awards, honors and recognitions, visit www.sph.unc.edu/school/recognitions.

spring 2008

Dr. Rosalind Coleman

Dr. Jonathan Kotch

Kotch will collaborate with Children in Scotland, a national agency of more than 400 volunteer and nonprofit organizations working to promote the well-being of children and their families.

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Dr. Ivan Rusyn, associate professor of environmental sciences and engineering, received the Society of Toxicology’s Achievement Award at the Society’s 47th annual meeting on March 16, 2008, in Seattle. Rusyn received his doctorate at UNC in 2000 and worked as a postdoctoral fellow before joining the faculty in 2002. Dr. Anna Maria Siega-Riz, associate professor in the departments of epidemiology and nutrition, was the recipient of the March of Dimes’ 2007 Agnes Higgins Award. The annual award recognizes distinguished achievement in research, education or clinical services in the field of maternal-fetal nutrition. Awardees receive a $3,000 prize and the invitation to lecture at the American Public Health Association’s annual meeting, which, last year, was held in November in Washington, D.C. Siega-Riz’s lecture topic at the meeting was “Maternal Obesity: The Number One Problem Facing Prenatal Care Providers in the New Millennium. Dr. Steve Zeisel received the Osborne and Mendel Award from the American Society for Nutrition, in recognition of outstanding recent basic research accomplishments in Dr. Steve Zeisel nutrition. The award was presented at the Federation of American Societies of Experimental Biology international meeting in San Diego in April 2008. Zeisel also was recognized at the conference by the American College of Nutrition (ACN). He received the ACN Lifetime Achievement Award for research accomplishments in nutrition.

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A LU M N I Dr. F. Dubois Bowman, (Biostatistics ’00), associate professor of biostatistics and director of the Center for Biomedical Imaging Statistics at Emory University, received the Grizzle Outstanding Alumnus Award in April 2008. The award was presented at the departmental meeting of the UNC School of Public Health’s annual Fred T. Foard Jr. Memorial Lecture in Chapel Hill, N.C. Over the past eight years, Bowman has built a distinguished record of scholarship and service, serving on National Institutes of Health (NIH) study sections, obtaining a statistical methodology R01 grant from NIH, and holding an elected office in the Eastern North American Region of the International Biometric Society (ENAR). The late Diane Hedgecock is the recipient of the 2008 Sidney S. Chipman Alumni Award. The annual Alumni Award honors Dr. Chipman, founder of the UNC Department of Maternal and Child Health, and is given to a graduate of the department who has made outstanding contributions to the field of maternal and child health. Joan Hedgecock, Diane’s sister, accepted the award on her behalf at the School’s annual Fred T. Foard Jr. Memorial Lecture in April. Hedgecock, a 1975 master’s degree graduate from the School’s Department of Maternal and Child Health, dedicated her career to improving maternal health, including reproductive health and child survival. In her role as senior technical advisor at John Snow, Inc. (JSI), from 1985 until her death on March 8, 2008, Hedgecock shepherded such successful JSI projects as the Romania Family Health Initiative, the BASICS child survival program, the Cambodia Community Outreach project and the African portfolio of countries under the SEATS Family Planning Service Expansion and Technical Support project. In the late ’70s, she served as director of health programming and training for the U.S. Peace Corps headquarters, where she was responsible for

overall health policy and program development in 67 Peace Corps countries. Charles W. McGrew, an alumnus of the School’s Department of Health Policy and Administration, was awarded the School’s 2008 Harriet Hylton Barr Distinguished Alumni Award at the School of Public Health’s annual Fred T. Foard Jr. Memorial Lecture in April. McGrew is deputy director and chief operating officer of the Arkansas Department of Health. His career spans more than 35 years of public health service to the people of Arkansas. Established in 1975, the Barr Award recognizes the achievements of alumni and their contributions to public health. The award carries the name of its 1980 recipient — Harriet Hylton Barr — who earned her master’s in public health from UNC in 1948 and is clinical associate professor emeritus in the School’s Department of Health Behavior and Health Education.

S T U DEN TS Eleven students from the UNC School of Public Health were recognized with 2008 Impact Awards from the UNC Graduate School. The awards honor graduate students whose research provides special benefits to the citizens of North Carolina. Awardees also serve as graduate student ambassadors, talking to community groups throughout the state about their work. Winners from the School of Public Health are Janne Boone and Alexia Smith, doctoral students in nutrition; Anthony Fleg, medical student and 2007 master’s degree graduate from the Public Health Leadership Program and Patrick Carlsen Smith, medical student and 2008 master’s degree graduate from the same department; Erin Fraher and John Staley, doctoral students in health policy and administration; Morgan Jones, 2007 master’s degree graduate from the Department of Health Policy and Administration; and Amy Kalkbrenner, Sandra McCoy, Lynne Sampson and Elizabeth Torrone, doctoral students in epidemiology.

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Celebrating friends who make a

World of DiΩerence

n Czech, it’s Dĕkuji. In Mandarin, it’s Xie Xie. In Turkish, it’s Tesekkür ederim. In English, it’s Thank You. On Nov. 29, 2007, the atrium in the Michael Hooker Research Center was transformed into a magical setting. Each linen-covered table held a “thank you” sign in a different language, reminding guests that their gifts and support for the School reach all around the globe. In all, 130 people attended the School’s second annual “A World of Difference” dinner honoring the School’s foremost benefactors. Over a dinner of arugula salad and halibut in Pernod, conversations buzzed between scholarship donors and recipients, faculty members, school advisors and other benefactors. Fred Brown (MPH ’82) president of the Public Health Foundation Board of Directors, welcomed guests and thanked them for their gifts of time and money. Donald Holzworth described why he and his wife, Jennifer, chose to establish scholarships in honor of their fathers. Former professor Dennis Gillings talked about why he and his wife, Joan, decided to make the largest gift in the history of the UNC system to the School of Public Health. They were joined by Stacy-

Ann Christian (MPH ’06), who earned her masters in public health in 2006 on a scholarship and already has set up a scholarship of her own to honor her late brother. (See inside back cover.) “The dinner is our opportunity to say ‘thank you’ in a special way to our most generous friends,” says Peggy Dean Glenn, associate dean for external affairs. “We hope more and more people will join us for this fun evening. The dinner honors all endowment donors and members of the Cornerstone and Rosenau Societies.” The Rosenau Society, named in honor of Milton J. Rosenau, the School’s first dean, com-

P hotos b y M a r i b e l M a n i bo

P hoto b y M a r i b e l M a n i bo

8 in 2004. As director of the School’s Office of Research, she works to enhance the research enterprise at the School by engaging faculty, staff, students and others across the School, campus and beyond.

awards and recognitions

prises donors who annually give $1,000 or more, providing current funds to be used where they are needed most. President’s Circle members ($5,000-$25,000), Chancellor’s Circle ($2,000-$4,999) and Dean’s Circle ($1,000-$1,999)

are honored members of the society. The Cornerstone Society recognizes donors who have named rooms or other spaces within the School’s building complex. To join the Rosenau Society, or make a donation of any amount to the School of Public Health, please see www.sph. unc.edu/giving, or contact the School’s Office of External Affairs at (919) 966-0198. “All of our friends make a world of difference in our ability to anticipate public health needs and accelerate public health solutions,” Glenn says. n – b y R a m on a dubos e

Top photo: (Left and right) Phyllis and Robert Verhalen (MPH '65, DrPH '72)enjoy the evening with Yvonne Golightly (center), doctoral student in epidemiology and recipient of the Robert Verhalen Scholarship in Injury Prevention. Bottom photo: Alison Wise (left), doctoral student in biostatistics and recipient of the John and Diane Fryer Fellowship, meets her benefactor, Diane E. Medcalf (right).

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Celebrating friends who make a

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$100,000 gift helps School create Certificate in Global Health in distance education format

n anonymous $100,000 gift to the UNC School of Public Health will allow the School to create an online Certificate in Global Health to reach a broad range of students, including working health professionals and volunteers at nongovernmental organizations. The School’s Office of Global Health presently offers a Certificate in Global Health to the School’s residential graduate students. It complements graduate students’ departmental requirements by offering courses, seminars and fieldwork or internships to provide them with a comprehensive understanding of global health conditions, needs and solutions that cross borders in developing and industrialized countries and regions. The $100,000 gift will help the School’s Office of Global Health, in partnership with the Public Health Leadership Program, establish technology and teaching resources to offer a similar certificate in a distance education format. The curriculum for the online certificate will be tailored to working health professionals. It will consist of five courses — including infectious disease epidemiology and global health

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ethics — taken in sequence. Developing an online Certificate in Global Health would be impossible without philanthropic gestures from generous givers, says Dr. Margaret Bentley, the School’s associate dean of global health. “It’s quite a show of support,” Bentley says of the recent gift. “The gift was seed money for us to get started. We are fundraising for the remainder of the project. Additional funding will help us diversify the course curriculum.” A market survey conducted by the School among 30,000 individuals affiliated with UNC — many of whom work at international organizations in the Research Triangle area — demonstrated the need for the online certificate program, says Bentley, who is involved in the design and implementation of the program. “If we had the certificate tomorrow, about 200 people said they would sign up for it right away,” she says. For more information about the online Certificate in Global Health, visit www.sph.unc. edu/globalhealth/certificate. To learn about how you can help make the online certificate a reality, contact Stephen Couch at (919) 966-0219 or stephen_couch@unc.edu. n

Your Gift Today... a healthier tomorrow Bequests are a vital source of support for the School of Public Health. Bequests: • create scholarships • establish professorships • build new facilities • support research • improve the public’s health The UNC School of Public Health’s future depends on you — our friends and alumni who remember the School in their estate plans. Your bequest will help to ensure the School of Public Health’s continued excellence. In an era of shrinking federal support, bequests are more important than ever. Contact us today about including the UNC School of Public Health in your estate plans. Let us know if you need more information by checking the appropriate box in the enclosed envelope or call, write, or email: Lyne S. Gamble, Jr. Director of Major and Planned Gifts UNC School of Public Health Campus Box 7407 Chapel Hill, NC 27599-7407 lyne_gamble@unc.edu 919.966.8368

UNC professor establishes new professorship for visiting faculty from developing countries

reating opportunities for talented bio-statisticians from developing countries to learn, grow and contribute to Carolina’s educational experience is important to Dr. Pranab K. Sen, himself a native of India who first came to UNC in 1965 as a visiting assistant professor of biostatistics. Since 1982, Sen has served as Cary C. Boshamer Distinguished Professor of biostatistics at the UNC School of Public Health and professor of statistics and operations research at UNC’s College of Arts and Sciences. Sen’s experience at Carolina inspired him, his family, and colleagues, friends and former students to establish the Pranab K. Sen Distinguished

Visiting Professorship. The new professorship will allow biostatisticians from developing countries to work at UNC for a semester or a year. The Sen Family contributed $304,500 toward the new professorship and colleagues, friends and former students contributed $29,750. UNC has applied for state matching contributions of $167,000 to make an endowment total of $501,250 for this professorship. Sen hopes scholars attending Carolina with the help of this new distinguished visiting professorship will learn and contribute new methodologies in statistics while at UNC. The professorship will be awarded

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to bio-statisticians whose knowledge lends itself to the study of statistical interaction in interdisciplinary fields including pharmacogenomics, bioinformatics and clinical sciences. It is preferred that professorship recipients return to their native countries for at least one academic year after their time at Carolina so that they may more fully share their experiences with those in their country. For more information about the professorship, please contact Lyne Gamble, director of major and planned gifts at the School of Public Health’s

he University’s Carolina First campaign ended on Dec. 31, 2007, with more than $2.38 billion raised. It was the fifth largest fundraising drive among completed campaigns in the country and the largest ever in the Southeast. Led by Campaign Chair Robert J. Greczyn, Jr., MPH ’81, president and CEO of BlueCross and BlueShield of North Carolina, the School of Public Health surged past its $100 million goal to end its portion of the campaign at $164,219,849. More than 6,000 donors contributed to the School’s success, including alumni, par-

Dr. Pranab K. Sen

Office of External Affairs at (919) 966-8368 or lyne_gamble@unc.edu. n – B y P r a sh a nt N a i r , P h D

ents, friends, faculty, staff, foundations, corporations and organizations. “Dennis and Joan Gillings’ $50 million gift was, of course, extraordinary,” says Peggy Glenn, associate dean for external affairs, “but we could not have achieved these results without the thousands of friends who supported scholarships, professorships, facilities, special endowments, new programs and the Annual Fund. We hope everyone who participated shares our joy in what was achieved. Your gifts are making a world of difference in North Carolina and around the globe.”

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$100,000 gift helps School create Certificate in Global Health in distance education format

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UNC professor establishes new professorship for visiting faculty from developing countries

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Dr. Pranab K. Sen

Office of External Affairs at (919) 966-8368 or lyne_gamble@unc.edu. n – B y P r a sh a nt N a i r , P h D

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GSK extends support for Pharmacoepidemiology Center

uilding on its initial $3 million investment, GlaxoSmithKline (GSK) has committed another $250,000 to support the UNC-GlaxoSmithKline Center of Excellence in Pharmacoepidemiology and Public Health. The Center, established in 2003, provides opportunities

for innovative research and training in the field of pharmacoepidemiology — the study of the use and effects of drugs in large numbers of people. “The Center provides excellent opportunities for our graduate students to prepare for careers that allow them to address the safety and ef-

fectiveness of medicines and treatments,” says Dr. Andrew Olshan, chair of the epidemiology department, which houses the Center. “They can also test new methodological tools. They have an opportunity to learn how to apply the things they learn in the lab and classroom to real-world situations. In addition, the Center provides a venue for faculty to develop new research opportunities. We are grateful to GSK, not only for their donation, but also for internship and guidance opportunities they provide for our students.” Dr. Alice White, GSK vice

president of Worldwide Epidemiology and a School alum (see page 29), has led GSK’s support of the center. “Epidemiology is becoming an increasingly important factor in health care. Whether we’re trying to promote better health, prevent illness or treat diseases, we have to have a better understanding of all factors influencing populations. Epidemiology gives us the tools we need. And the Center helps us focus these tools to understand the risks and benefits of many treatments and interventions, including new medicines,” White says. n

A Charitable Gift Annuity: The Gift that Gives Back With relative ease, you can set up a charitable gift annuity. An annuity will provide: • income for life • a charitable tax deduction • the satisfaction of supporting the School of Public Health Let us show you what your return will be based on your age, your financial plans and current interest rates. Sample annuity interest rates* Your Age Annuity Rate

60 70 75

5.7% 6.5% 7.1%

Your Ages Annuity Rate

65/63 70/68 75/73

5.6% 5.8% 6.2%

*Rates are subject to change

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You may indicate your need for more information by checking the appropriate box in the enclosed envelope or call, write or email: Lyne S. Gamble, Jr. Director of Major and Planned Gifts UNC School of Public Health Campus Box 7407 Chapel Hill, NC 27599-7407 lyne_gamble@unc.edu 919.966.8368

Stacy-Ann Christian, JD, MPH

Giving an opportunity to students with passion Trained as an attorney, Stacy-Ann Christian knew that people and public health were her real passions. That’s why, with her brother’s encouragement and the offer of scholarships for graduate study, she made the decision to follow her heart to Carolina’s School of Public Health. Unfortunately, Christian’s brother, Clive Boxhill, died the same year she started her degree. Twenty-year-old Clive, her confidante and cheerleader, lost his six-year battle with lupus in 2004, after six open-heart surgeries. To honor him, Christian has pledged $25,000 to establish The Clive Boxhill Jr. Scholarship in Health Policy at the School of Public Health. Clive Boxhill Jr.

“At a point when I needed a family, the School of Public Health took an interest in me. It’s important for me to help other students have this chance,” she says. “This is personal for me. Carolina was my home. I want other people who have the passion to have a chance.” Read more about Stacy-Ann Christian at www.sph.unc.edu/giving/give_support.html.

Create a scholarship—transform a life. Scholarships provide opportunities for talented students who might not otherwise be able to pursue their educational dreams. To discuss the many options for establishing a named scholarship, call (919) 966-0198. The enclosed gift envelope may be used to add to an existing scholarship, support the Annual Fund or join the Rosenau Society, all of which are investments in our future public health leaders.

This issue of Carolina Public Health is made possible, in part, by a generous gift from Keith Crisco and the Asheboro Elastics Corporation.

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