Dean and a Distinguished University Professor

Dr. Joshi is Dean and a Distinguished University Professor of the School of Public Health, University of Memphis, TN, USA. Dr. Joshi is an innovator, entrepreneur, educator, researcher, administrator, and mentor. He is an established population health informatics researcher who combines his academic training in clinical medicine, public health, and informatics to design and develop human-centered, technology-enabled interventions to enhance population health outcomes across diverse community settings. He has extensive experience in utilizing community and hospital-based data to implement and evaluate informatics-enabled solutions to address social, economic, and health inequities of the 21st century. He combines data-driven innovative entrepreneurial creative approaches to advance excellence in public health education, and research, that can address public health challenges in the community by preparing the next generation of public health leaders.

Despite his administrative role, continues scholarly and research contributions toward improving the good health and well-being of individuals, families, and the communities they live in. Dr. Joshi conceptualized the SMAART (Sustainable, Multisector, Accessible, Affordable, Reimbursable, and Tailored) model using combined principles of the human-centered approach, humanistic, behavioral, learning, and information processing theory to advance the achievement of Sustainable Development Goals. He has designed and developed, standalone and internet-enabled, multi-lingual, digital health interventions such as population health dashboards, consumer health informatics, m-health interventions, and population-based surveillance tools across multiple settings to improve population health outcomes. Dr. Joshi successfully completed more than two dozen research projects in the areas of population health informatics across multiple countries including the US, India, Nigeria, Bangladesh, Haiti, Egypt, and Brazil. These projects were funded by several Federal, State, and International government agencies and other private foundations. Dr. Joshi also launched the first of its kind fully online Certificate and MS Population Health Informatics Programs. He was awarded by the Open Society Institute to establish the Regional Population Health Informatics Education Hub to prepare the public health workforce with skills in population health informatics and how community data can be utilized to design human-centered interventions for the improvement of population health outcomes. The hub is established at BRAC James P Grant School of Public Health with an aim to create a regional network of experts in the population health informatics field ready to respond as a team to the next public health challenge.

Dr. Joshi was a founding member of the CUNY SPH and has made a significant contribution to advancing the CUNY SPH by providing leadership for the planning and implementation of all components of the academic programs including curriculum implementation, new academic programs, and 4+1 pipeline initiatives, online instruction, accreditation, career and experiential learning, and student and faculty affairs, and Human Research Protection Office. Dr. Joshi implemented technology-enabled data-driven informed decision-making to bring more transparency and equity across various academic and administrative units. Dr. Joshi was presented with the inaugural CUNY SPH Legacy Award for his crucial role in the establishment of CUNY SPH as an independent graduate school within the CUNY system. Dr. Joshi has been leading CUNY SPH efforts to implement the NYC Resource Navigator Test and Trace Program in response to the COVID-19 pandemic and secured an award of a $10 million contract with the Housing Recovery Operations of the Mayor’s Office to implement the aftercare resource navigator program to address COVID-19 recovery efforts. Dr. Joshi was presented with the Distinguished Service Award by the NYC Test and Trace Corps program for his extraordinary dedication and contributions to reversing the COVID-19 outbreak and protecting and promoting the safety and well-being of New York residents.

He has developed SMAART public health intervention incubator in India and expanded it across several states in India with an aim to bring public health research into action through multisector partnerships, data-driven interventions, Innovations, skill-based training, and innovative and sustainable community programs, that address health inequities. He was invited to present the SMAART model at the WHO, United Nations, and several other agencies nationally and globally.

Currently, he is the Chair of the Global Health Informatics Working Group of the American Medical Informatics Association. He is also an author of the first textbook published on Population Health Informatics: Driving Evidence-based solutions into practice published by Jones Bartlett.

He is primary author of the first recently published text book on “Population Health Informatics: Driving evidence based solutions into practice”.

Read More

CUNY Graduate School of Public Health & Health Policy

Dr. Ayman El-Mohandes, Dean of the City University of New York Graduate School of Public Health and Health Policy (CUNY SPH), is a pediatrician and public health academic with a deep commitment to public service. He is an established researcher in the field of infant mortality reduction in minority populations. Dr. El-Mohandes’ funded research focuses on population-based interventions in underserved communities both locally and globally. His publication record includes innovative approaches towards improving perinatal and neonatal outcomes in high risk populations.

Dr. El-Mohandes has served as a senior consultant on multiple global health services and public health interventions funded by the U.S. Agency for International Development (USAID), the Asia Development Bank and the Government of South Africa. These projects included the “Healthy Mother Healthy Child” program in Egypt to upgrade obstetric and neonatal services in the districts with the highest infant mortality, a “Health Services Program” in Indonesia, and establishing the first school of public health for black students in South Africa. He was elected to the Board of the Association of Schools and Programs in Public Health in 2015 and was presented with the APHA Executive Director Citation Award in 2017. He is an elected member of the American Pediatric Society and a fellow of the American Academy of Pediatrics.

CUNY SPH has undergone dramatic transformation since Dr. El-Mohandes became Dean in 2013. Under his leadership it has become an independent school within the CUNY system and received full re-accreditation in 2016. Six new institutes and centers have been launched¬¬—with an accompanying surge in research activity and funding—and an active working partnership with the NYC Department of Health and Mental Hygiene has been formed. The CUNY SPH instructional portfolio has expanded similarly, with a range of new certificate programs and master’s and doctoral degrees, many of which are available fully online.

Jose Florez-Arango is a Medical Doctor (MD) trained in Medellin Colombia, with a master’s degree in Biomedical Sciences, and a PhD on Health Informatics.
He was a Fulbright scholar and has experience in emergency medicine, prehospital care and emergency management, tropical diseases, global health, and telemedicine. As an Informatician, his previous experience includes clinical decision support systems, development of health information systems based-on international standards, mHealth, human-computer interaction, human factors, interoperability and controlled vocabularies. He has participated in curricular reforms, developed curricular content, and implemented electronic curriculum management tools. He has also been involved in developing clinical simulation centers in Colombia, two virtual learning environments, and one dual degree online master program. He has taught courses on the practice of medicine, foreign languages, human physiology, medical semiology, emergency and disaster medicine, and health informatics. He is passionate about exploring new didactics and methods for knowledge and skills acquisition for health professionals.

JPGSPH, Brac University

Dr. Tanvir Hasan is an Associate Professor and Co-Director of Centre of Excellence for Urban Equity and Health (CUEH) at BRAC JPGSPH. He holds a PhD from the University of Queensland, Australia. He also holds a Master of Science and a Bachelor of Science degree in Applied Statistics from Dhaka University, Bangladesh. He was a recipient of the International Postgraduate Research Scholarship (IPRS) and Australian Postgraduate Award (APA). He teaches Biostatistics and Quantitative Research Methods in the Master of Public Health programme. Besides teaching, he currently leads two research projects. One of the projects is nationwide research focuses on the sexual and reproductive health and rights (SRHR) of persons with disabilities in Bangladesh. Another focuses on the health and well-being of ready-made garments (RMG) workers in urban slums of Dhaka, Bangladesh. He also Co-leads two research projects. Dr Tanvir’s expertise is in advanced statistical analysis, mixed methods research, implementation research and spatial epidemiological research. His research work mainly focuses on maternal and child nutrition, social determinants of health and sexual and reproductive health. Read More

Dr. M. Shafiqur Rahman is an adjunct faculty and technical advisor (part time) at the JPG School of Public Health, BRAC University. He is working as a Professor of Applied Statistics at the Institute of Statistical Research and Training, University of Dhaka. His main research areas include public health, epidemiology and biostatistics, focusing on development of new methods for analyzing data in public health and medical research. He is also interested in meta-analysis, causal inference and survey research methods. So far he published over 35 research papers in peer reviewed journals, few monograph and scientific reports and guided a number of undergraduate and postgraduate students for preparing their projects and thesis. He presented research findings in many national and international conferences and seminar series. In addition to teaching and research, he is also involved with statistical consultancy services for various national and international organizations. He has been serving as an academic editor of PLOS One and reviewer of a number of peer-reviewed journals. He is a member of the Bangladesh Statistical Association, International Biometric Society, International Statistical Institute, International Society of Clinical Biostatistics and an educational ambassador of the American Statistical Association from Bangladesh.