MPH News

Ninety-eight Tennessee women died in 2020 during or shortly after pregnancy. More than a quarter of those deaths were tied to substance abuse. Numbers like that are why Firefly — a rigorous program at Vanderbilt University Medical Center — is helping mothers in recovery have a healthy pregnancy and postpartum… Read More

Erin Gillaspie, MD, MPH, has a number stuck in her head that she’s not likely to ever forget: 289. That’s because the Vanderbilt University Medical Center thoracic surgeon is only the 289th female surgeon in her specialty in the United States. “There aren’t a lot of women in my field in… Read More

Emergency Medicine and Trauma Surgery researchers at Vanderbilt University Medical Center are joining Vanderbilt LifeFlight in a Department of Defense (DOD)-funded clinical trial aimed at improving survival with resuscitation techniques used to keep patients alive after a traumatic injury. Emergency medicine services (EMS) personnel currently use one of two common… Read More

The Vanderbilt Institute for Global Health, Vanderbilt Department of Biostatistics, and Aminu Kano Teaching Hospital (AKTH) have partnered on a new program to train a cohort of highly skilled Nigerian biostatisticians to lead and supervise high-level biostatistics activities for HIV research studies in West Africa. Biomedical HIV research is growing… Read More

Each spring, Vanderbilt University School of Medicine recognizes members of the graduating MD class for outstanding academic achievement, service, research, and leadership. VUSM faculty and fellow students celebrated the following recipients of school and departmental awards at the MD Class Day ceremony on Thursday, May 12, 2022: Excellence in Public… Read More

During the COVID-19 pandemic, outpatient telehealth appointments at Vanderbilt University Medical Center reached a peak of 2,700 in one day as clinicians worked to ensure patients received uninterrupted care as the public health crisis continued. In response to the pandemic, Tennessee legislators passed a law in August 2020 requiring health… Read More

When it comes to health care for adolescents, patient autonomy and parental responsibility are at times forced into opposition, and when adolescent patients in the U.S. seek care for sensitive issues — sexually transmitted infections, mental health problems, drug use, contraception, etc. — the health care team’s ability to render… Read More

For more than a decade, a rare side effect reported by patients with influenza has puzzled clinicians and researchers. In some cases, patients with flu have experienced neuropsychiatric symptoms, such as behavior changes, hallucinations and even attempted suicide. The question: Are these neurologic or psychiatric complications due to the infection… Read More

Vanderbilt Chancellor Daniel Diermeier and Provost and Vice Chancellor for Academic Affairs C. Cybele Raver honored faculty from across the university at an endowed chair investiture ceremony on campus Feb. 24, conferring the university’s highest scholastic rank on those who had received the designation during the COVID-19 pandemic in 2020… Read More

Digital health interventions — delivered via technologies including text messages, apps and websites — are increasingly common for supporting chronic disease self-care. Although studies have focused on improving patient engagement with these interventions, limited research has addressed the association between engagement and clinical outcomes.  Lyndsay Nelson, PhD, Andrew Spieker, PhD, and… Read More