Director:

William Livingood, PhD

Dr. Bill Livingood, Director of the Institute and Associate Professor of Pediatrics at the University of Florida, has been a university professor for over thirty years (first tenured and promoted to associate professor in 1976 and promoted to professor in 1983), during which time he served as an academic department chairperson for over 15 years.  

He has been Principal Investigator or Co-Principal Investigator for numerous community based applied research and evaluation projects involving the use of a variety of research designs including studies related to: tobacco control, HIV/AIDS, maternal and child health, physical activity and obesity reduction, and health professions and workforce development.   He has lead research efforts funded by a range of national organizations including the American Public Health Association and the Health Resources and Services Administration related to public health workforce and credentialing issues.  In addition he has done work for maternal & child health projects with funding from the CDC and HRSA Maternal & Child Health Bureau and state Departments of Health for Pennsylvania and Florida.  Other research efforts include a variety of substance abuse and child abuse related evaluation projects, funded by national organizations through local and state agencies. 

He has held national, state and local leadership positions for a variety of voluntary, professional and advocacy health organizations. He presents at numerous professional meetings on an annual basis, is published in a broad range of national public health and health promotion journals, and serves as a reviewer for many of those journals.  He is immediate past President of the Council of Accredited MPH Programs and he received the Distinguished Fellow recognition from the Society for Public Health Education (SOPHE) in 2000.

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Administrator:

Thomas Bryant III, MSW

Thomas Bryant III began working with the Duval County Health Department first as director of the Center for Disease Control-funded Adolescent Pregnancy Prevention Program and its evaluation.  He has directed research, planning and evaluation programs at the Northeast Florida Regional Planning Council, the New York City Department of Probation, and the New York City Commission on Human Rights.  He taught graduate and undergraduate courses at Columbia University, New York University and Tusculum College.  Mr. Bryant received his Master's degree in Social Work from Florida State University.  He continued his post graduate education in Social Research in the doctoral program at the Columbia University School of Social Work.  Mr. Bryant has extensive training and experience in research design, database design and development and qualitative and quantitative analyses.  He is proficient in statistical (SPSS and EPI Info), database (Access & SQL), spreadsheet, mapping and presentation software packages.  He serves on the Northeast Florida Healthy Start Coalition and the Community Partnership for the Protection of Children Governing Board.  

Dr. Nancy Winterbauer is a medical anthropologist and epidemiologist.  She received a PhD in Biomedical Anthropology from Binghamton University (SUNY) and a MS degree in Epidemiology from the University at Albany (SUNY).  She has extensive experience in mixed-methods research, which she has applied to studies of gender and health, sexually transmitted infections, domestic violence, social marketing and program evaluation.  She has served as PI or primary evaluator on numerous studies, including a CDC/HRSA-funded evaluation of an AIDS and Corrections Demonstration Project – Jacksonville Jail LINC (Linking Inmates to Care), a breastfeeding promotion program targeting clients attending DCHD WIC clinics, and a civil-legal needs assessment of clients seeking services at the DCHD, Center for Women and Children.  She is a founding member of the community-based participatory research group, Community Research Partners for Kids with Special Needs and is a Co-investigator, along with other members of the partnership, of an NIH-funded research project to develop and evaluate an intervention to enhance care coordination for special needs children.  In addition to her position at the Institute, Dr. Winterbauer is an Assistant Professor of Anthropology at the University of North Florida, where she teaches courses in health and illness, cross-cultural methods, and diversity.  Prior to joining DCHD, Dr. Winterbauer was a Senior Research Scientist in the School of Public Health at the University of Illinois, Chicago, where she conducted street ethnography related to syphilis and HIV among out-of-treatment injection drug users, sex workers, and men who have sex with men.  

Rebecca Filipowicz joined the Institute for Health, Policy and Evaluation Research in September, 2005.  Rebecca has been an employee of the Florida Department of Health since December, 2003.  She formerly held a position as a regional coordinator for Chronic Disease Health Promotion and Education in the panhandle of Florida.  Rebecca holds a Master’s degree in Public Health with a major in Behavioral Sciences and Health Education from Emory University in Atlanta, Georgia.  She also holds a Master’s degree in Kinesiology with an emphasis in Exercise Physiology from the University of North Texas.  In addition Rebecca is a certified health education specialist.  Prior to working for the Florida DOH, she was an instructional designer and evaluation coordinator for the Career MPH program at the Rolllins School of Public Health at Emory University.  Rebecca is also adjunct faculty with the Career MPH program at Emory University and the College of Health at the University of North Florida.  She has worked as a consultant for Health Consulting Group, Inc. in Atlanta, Georgia, specifically on HIV related projects and workforce development.  Rebecca has experience working in program evaluation, workforce development, instructional design, research methods, distance learning, teaching and project development.

Coordinator for the Center for Policy Research:

Susan Coughlin, MPH

Susan Coughlin joined the Institute in July 2004.  She received a Bachelor’s degree from the University of Michigan with dual major in Economics and Organizational Studies.  From 2000-2001, she worked in employee benefits consulting where she concentrated in health and life insurance cost/benefit analysis before returning to school for her master’s.  She received an MPH in Health Policy and Management from Columbia University’s Mailman School of Public Health.  The summer before she received her master’s degree, she was a health care policy intern at the United States Government Accountability Office (GAO) in Washington, DC.  After receiving her degree, she worked at the University of Medicine and Dentistry of New Jersey (UMDNJ) on the evaluation of New Jersey’s Comprehensive Cancer Control Plan in conjunction with the New Jersey Department of Health and Senior Services.  Currently, Susie works on the evaluation and data management of a CDC-funded project with DCHD’s AIDS Program Office.  She has also recently completed an evidence-based policy report on the prevention of childhood obesity. 

Radley Remo received his Master's in Public Health in Epidemiology from the University of South Florida.  He received his Bachelor’s degree in Health Sciences from the University of North Florida.  He has over seven years experience working at the Duval County Health Department as a Research Associate and Health Educator.  He has worked as a Senior Data Analyst for an academic medical center (Shands Jacksonville) in Jacksonville, FL and as a Research Assistant at James A. Haley Veteran’s Hospital in Tampa, FL.  He has a wide range of skills and knowledge of data analysis and collection tools (SPSS, ARC GIS and Teleform).

David Wood joined the University of Florida in 2000 as the Chief of the Division of Community Pediatrics.  He is board certified in preventive medicine and public health. He completed his medical and public health training at UCLA where he stayed for his residency in Pediatrics and Preventive Medicine.  He concluded his training with a fellowship in Health Services Research at RAND-UCLA.  Dr. Wood has an extensive career in health services research focusing on children’s health.   He has done research at Los Angeles County Public Health Department, UCLA School of Medicine, the Delmarva Foundation, Shriners Hospital for Children in Tampa, and at the University of Florida here in Jacksonville.  Currently, he works collaboratively with the Duval County Health Department on many projects including: Utilization of Primary and Specialty Care by persons with Mental Retardation/Developmental Disabilities in Florida, Social Capital and Immunization Receipt among inner-city preschoolers, providing a Medical Home model for special needs children, homeless children and adolescents transitioning to adult health care services.  He also is attending pediatrician at the Kids ‘N Care clinic, a clinic for children in foster care and homeless children, and in the Jacksonville Health and Transition Services clinic at Shands/UF Internal Medicine clinic. 

Tao Hou received his Master’s in Public Health from the University of South Florida. His previous experience includes working as a research assistant for the Prevention Science & Methodology Group at University of South Florida.  His major contribution included data analysis for Baltimore Prevention Program by using Growth Mixture Modeling and programming for "Power Calculation Web Approach for Longitudinal Prevention Project".  Tao was also involved in “Youth Drug Treatment Program” at St. Petersburg, FL and the Library of Congress “Mail Irradiation Study”.

Currently Tao is the biostatistician for the Institute of Health, Policy and Evaluation Research which provides general biostatistical consultation for data management planning, statistical analyses, grant and manuscript preparation, and statistical computing. His recent research activities have focused on statistical analysis for a project related to access to primary and specialty medical care for persons with mental retardation or developmental diseases in Florida and preventable morbidity; as well as a pilot study of the impact of pre- and inter-conceptional care case management on birth outcomes of high-risk women.

Research Associate:

Kimberly Pierce, MPH

Kimberly Pierce received her Master's in Public Health from Emory University’s Rollins School of Public Health (RSPH) in 2005.  Her previous experience includes working as a Research Specialist for Emory University’s School of Medicine (2000-2006), a research intern for the RSPH’s department of Global Health’s Molecular Epidemiology Unit (2004-2005), and as a systematic literature reviewer for the CDC’s Community Guide-Task force for Community Preventive Services within the division of Nutrition and Physical Activity (2005-2006).  Kimberly has extensive experience in quantitative analysis through statistical software packages (SAS, Epi Info, and SPSS) and database management through Access software.

Ryan Diduk received a Bachelor of Arts in psychology from Russell Sage College in Troy,NY.  She competed her Master's of Public Health with a concentration in Community Health Education from East Stroudsburg University.  She is a Certified Health Education Specialist (CHES) and also holds a position on the national leadership board of the Society for Public Health Education through November 2007. 

She has worked on various projects related to pregnancy and tobacco use, crimes against women on college campuses, bioterrorism, and most recently  completed a study that investigated eating disorders in racially and ethnically diverse college women.

She also has spent time as an health educator at a children’s hospitalization program and as a graduate assistant in graduate school working on various research projects.

Lumi Razaila received a Master's in Mathematical Science from the University of North Florida and her Bachelor degree from the University of Bucharest, in Romania.  Her contributions to the Institute involve analyzing data and collecting summarized information available on the net, to create statistical reports or maps. At the present time she teaches Statistics for Health and Social Science at UNF where she is employed as a full-time Statistics Instructor. Her experience also includes working as a Statistics Researcher at Vistakon, a Johnson & Johnson subsidiary based here in Jacksonville, in their Department of Clinical Research.  She also works as a Statistical Consultant with the Southern Community Cohort Study.

Mr. Jackson received a Master degree in Public Administration from Troy State University and a Bachelor of Science degree in Accounting from Jackson State University. He began working with DCHD over 5 years ago in the Adolescent Pregnancy Prevention Program where he supervised data collection in the Teen Behavior Survey project where teens were used to survey other teens regarding risky behaviors in settings where they hangout, i.e, malls, parks, community centers. Mr. Jackson currently works as a GIS mapping analyst and database manager. In addition, he has been in the Air Force reserves for 22 years.

Anita holds Bachelor's of Arts degrees in Political Science and Anthropology from the University of North Florida. She has conducted two independent grant-funded qualitative research projects in Japan and now engages in qualitative research at the Institute including work for the Statewide HIV/AIDS needs assessment, evaluation of Healthy Childcare Jacksonville, a Childhood Obesity study, evaluation of the Anne E. Dyson foundation grant implementation, Medical Home project for children with special health care needs and the Magnolia study which looks at maternal health care.  

Annika is currently working on her Bachelor's of Arts Degree at University of North Florida with a major in Mathematics and a minor in Education.  She has been with the Institute since March 2006.  Her previous experience includes work with Covenant Hospice and the Jackson County Association of Retarded Citizens.   At the institute, Annika works on database development and management using Microsoft Access.  She partners with DCHD’s Healthy Jacksonville office on various projects, as well as local community organizations such as the March of Dimes.  She also does data collection and management for the Carol M. White Physical Education Program (PEP) Grant in conjunction with the Duval County School Board.

Staff Assistant:

Eulisa Morgan-Murphy, BA

Eulisa Morgan-Murphy received her Bachelors of Arts Degree in Business Administration.  She is planning on continuing her education with University South Florida with a Master’s Degree in Public Health.  Eulisa has been involved in several organizations within Duval County such as Study Circles of Jacksonville dealing with racial division, Healthy Families of Jacksonville, and Jacksonville Housing Authority aimed at helping senior citizens.  She has been working with the health department since April 2005 and is looking forward to continuing her qualitative and quantitative research. 

Kathleen has been associated with the Institute since it was formed in September 2001 and has extensive administrative experience.  In September 2006, she was honored with a Duval County Health Department, Senior Management Service Award.