Doctoral Alumni
Dr. Kelley Akiya obtained his PhD in public health with a concentration in Health Policy and Management in March 2024. Her research interests include social determinants of health and the integration of social services and health care to address health disparities. Before enrolling in NYU, she earned a Masters in Public Affairs from the University of Texas Austin and a BA in Psychology and Political Science from Washington University in St. Louis. Additionally, she worked as a program evaluator for 8 years, studying U.S-based and international interventions aimed at improving health, employment, and education outcomes.
Dr. Shahmir Ali obtained his PhD in Public Health with a concentration in social and behavioral sciences in October, 2022. His dissertation was entitled "Deconstructing the Influence of Family in the Diet of Asian American young adults: Exploring the Role of family structure, characteristics, and interaction patterns." Dr. Ali is a current Postdoctoral Research Fellow at the National University of Singapore Saw Swee Hock School of Public Health. He will be working under the programme evaluation arm of the Health Intervention and Policy Evaluation Research (HIPER) research unit.
He earned his bachelor’s degree from Johns Hopkins University in public health studies and political science. Prior to joining NYU, much of his research work as an undergraduate Woodrow Wilson research fellow and research assistant with the Johns Hopkins Bloomberg School of Public Health involved mixed-method observational and interventional studies on diet, behavior, and community health in Baltimore city corner stores, food pantries, grocery stores, and religious institutions. He planned to build on this work at NYU by exploring behavioral and cultural characteristics of diet and non-communicable disease disparities among Asian communities. He has also collaborated in projects with the George Institute for Global Health (China), the University of Queensland School of Public Health (Australia), and the Griffith University Centre for Environment and Population Health (Australia). Shahmir’s past research and publications have spanned work in the US, China, Australia, and Pakistan on topics ranging from mhealth, salt reduction, workplace health promotion, housing and environmental health, trauma and injury, water management and sanitation, and social determinants of health.
Dr. Priti Bandi obtained her PhD in Public Health with a concentration in Epidemiology in May 2019. Dr. Priti’s research focuses on the population-based surveillance of modifiable cancer risk behaviors, with an emphasis on tobacco use. She studies national and global patterns of diverse tobacco and nicotine products, with a focus on social disparities in their use behaviors. Her dissertation was entitled “Evolution of Educational Inequalities in Tobacco Use in Low- and Middle-Income Countries.” She currently works as a Principal Scientist in the Surveillance and Health Services Research Department of the American Cancer Society, Atlanta.
Dr. Drew Blasco obtained her PhD in Public Health in May 2021. She received a BA in Global Health and BS in Psychology in 2015. Additionally, she graduated with an MA in Global Health from Arizona State University where she focused on the stigma associated with obesity. Her training in the disciplines of psychology and global health led to her current research focus on mental illness, the effects of labeling, and stigma. After graduation, she plans to pursue a tenure-track position where she can incorporate her passion for research and teaching.
Dr. Shelby Brewer obtained her PhD in Public Health with a concentration in Health Policy and Management in March 2023. Her dissertation was entitled “The Effectiveness of State Mask Use Policies as a COVID-19 Mitigation Strategy: Perceptions and Outcomes Among African-Americans” which discussed the findings of perceptions about the preventive value of mask use, distrust of vaccinations, and COVID-19 infection risk and severity.
She received her Bachelors of Science degree with Honors in Allied Health Sciences (Pre-Med) from University of Connecticut. Shelby received her Masters of Science degree with honors in Health Promotion from the University of Connecticut. Her primary research interest is the impact of policy on the overall health status among underserved and vulnerable populations.
Dr. Ariadna Capasso obtained her PhD in public health concentrating in social and behavioral sciences in January 2022. She successfully defended her dissertation entitled "Violence Against Women and Problem Alcohol Use: An Investigation of Contributing and Protective Factors Among Latinas and Black Women in the U.S. Informed by the Theory of Gender and Power."
Prior to joining NYU, Ariadna was a senior technical advisor at Management Sciences for Health, where she provided strategic leadership and managed a wide range of sexual and reproductive health projects in Latin America and the Caribbean. She has over a decade of expertise providing technical support to United Nations agencies, such as the United Nations Population Fund and the Pan American Health Organization. In 2018, Ariadna was a fellow of the NIDA-funded Substance Abuse Research Education & Training (SARET) at NYU School of Medicine and was a recipient of a National Hispanic Health Foundation (NHHF) Hispanic Health Professional Student Scholarship. Then she served as a NIDA-funded T32 predoctoral fellow at the Behavioral Science Training in Drug Abuse Research program at the NYU Rory Meyers School of Nursing.
Dr. Amarilis Cespesde is GPH's first doctoral graduate who obtained her PhD in November 2017. Her dissertation was entitled “An Examination of the Relationships between Family Functioning, Asthma Self-Care Behaviors, and Asthma-related Morbidity in Young, Urban Latino and African American Adolescents with Uncontrolled Asthma.” She currently holds a position as City Research Scientist at NYU Health Department.
Dr. Gawon Cho obtained her PhD in public health with a concentration in Social-Behavioral Sciences in May 2023. Her dissertation was entitled "Work Schedules, sleep variability, and Cognition" and investigated trends in the population distribution of work schedules between the 1990s and the 2010s and how work schedules changed with age. She is primarily interested in the following two topics: (1) identifying occupational factors associated with the risk of cognitive decline later in life by applying statistical methods based on the life course theories and (2) disparities in pain medication use associated with obesity. She is especially interested in applying statistical methods based on life course theories (e.g., sequence analysis) to studying chronic comorbidities later in life. Her mentor at NYU was Dr. Virginia Chang. She will continue her work as a postdoctoral associate focusing on sleep and cognition at Yale School of Medicine.
Before joining the GPH community at NYU, she obtained a bachelor's degree in Psychology and Business at Yonsei University, Seoul, South Korea. She also studied Health Psychology in a graduate program at SUNY-Stony Brook for a year.
Dr. Marybec Griffin obtained her PhD in Public Health with a concentration in Social and Behavioral Sciences in May 2018. She has previously completed a MPH at NYU and holds a MA in International Affairs from the New School. Marybec’s research focuses on healthcare access among LGBTQ young adults, including the role of identity and health policy. Her dissertation was entitled “A Mixed Methods Examination of Barriers and Facilitators to Healthcare Access among Young Adult Gay Men.” She has worked at the NYC Department of Health and Mental Hygiene in the areas of HIV/AIDS policy and program design as well as helping to evaluate the quality of sexual health services and contraceptive coverage in NYC.
Dr. Griffin is currently an Assistant Professor in the Department of Health Behavior, Society and Policy at the Rutgers University School of Public Health. She is also involved with research projects at NYU focused on sexual assault at electronic dance music festivals and condom distribution programs.
Dr. Margaux Grivel earned her PhD in Public Health with a concentration in Social and Behavioral Sciences in July 2023. Dr. Grivel’s main research interest focuses on understanding how stigma surrounding infectious diseases (e.g., HIV, COVID-19), chronic conditions (e.g., cancer), and mental health disorders (e.g., schizophrenia, substance use disorder) –– as well as the stigma associated with their prevention and treatment (e.g., vaccines, medication-assisted therapy) –– affects the delivery and uptake of evidence-based care, particularly among underserved populations. She leverages her experience in measure development, stigma reduction strategies, mixed methods research, and community-engaged approaches to bridge the gap between research, practice, and policy.
Dr. Avni Gupta obtained her PhD in public health with a concentration in Health Policy and Management in December 2023. She received her dental surgery training from Government Dental College and Hospital, Jaipur, India and her Master’s in Public Health (Epidemiology and Biostatistics) from Johns Hopkins Bloomberg School of Public Health (JHSPH), Baltimore, USA. Prior to joining PhD at NYU, Avni worked as a Research Scientist for four years at Brigham and Women’s Hospital’s Center for Surgery and Public Health (joint collaboration of Harvard Medical School and Harvard T.N. Chan School of Public Health) in Boston. Her previous work experiences include dental surgery clinical practice, UNICEF, Save the Children and International Vaccine Access Center at JHSPH. Her research focuses on evaluating and promoting health equity, healthcare quality, healthcare data management, value-based healthcare as well as the integration and coordination of healthcare services, with a focus on primary and preventive care in diverse healthcare settings, both domestically and globally.
Dr. Sasha (Alexandra) Guttentag obtained her PhD in public health in May 2021. She was a student in Dr. Tom Kirchner's mHealth Lab. Originally from the SF Bay Area, she graduated from Johns Hopkins with a B.A. in Public Health in 2013 and completed a Fulbright Fellowship in southern Brazil in 2015. Sasha spent Fall 2017 completing a visiting research fellowship at ISPUP in Portugal, where she analyzed longitudinal data to evaluate patterns in smoking related to neighborhood deprivation and residential mobility amongst Portuguese women. Her main research interest centers on the applications of mobile technologies in health surveillance and behavior change. At GPH, she used mobile phone systems to evaluate the harm reduction potential of electronic cigarettes amongst cigarette smokers. Outside of GPH, she is an active member of the NYU Squash Club, and volunteers with Crisis Text Line. Currently, she holds a position as City Research Scientist at NYU Health Department.
Dr. Daniel Hagen obtained his PhD in public health with a concentration in Epidemiology in May 2023. His dissertation was entitled "Political and Socio-cultural Determinants of Gender Differences in Major Depression and Alcohol Use Disorder in the United States and Across Europe" which addressed research gaps by systematically examining associations of macro-level characteristics with gender differences in the prevalence of Major Depressive Disorders and Alcohol Use Disorder. His main interests are in the epidemiology and etiology of common psychiatric disorders, with a focus on health disparities, global mental health, and internationally comparative research. Daniel studied political science and sociology at the Universities of Mannheim, Bonn, and Copenhagen before majoring in Epidemiology in the International MPH program at the French School of Public Health (EHESP) in Paris. Amongst other things, he has worked on the effects of stigma and institutionalized discrimination on minority health in different settings, with experience in LGBT health research at the World Bank and the Mailman School of Public Health at Columbia University. More recently, he worked in project and science management for the funding initiative “Research Networks for Health Innovations in Sub-Saharan Africa” implemented by the German development agency GIZ in Berlin. Prior to that, he was a research assistant at the University of Bonn and a volunteer with the Regional Office for Africa of the German Academic Exchange Service (DAAD) in Nairobi. Dr. Hagen continues his career as a researcher on Dr. Robyn Gershon’s NYC Transit Workers COVID-19 Study.
Dr. Abbey Jones obtained her PhD in Public Health with a concentration in Epidemiology in March 2024. Prior to enrolling at NYU, Abbey worked at the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) in the Division of Congenital and Developmental Disorders for eight years, including 18 months working in the CDC’s Emergency Operations Center for the 2016 Zika Virus Response. Abbey has an MPH in Global Epidemiology from Emory University and an undergraduate degree in Mathematics from College of the Holy Cross. She has experience in the fields of public health surveillance, preparedness and response, infectious disease, and maternal and child health.
Dr. Keely Jordan obtained her PhD in Public Health in September 2021, specializing in global health policy. Keely received her undergraduate degree in political science and sociology from the University of Pennsylvania and her master’s degree in global health from the University of California San Francisco (UCSF). Prior to joining NYU she worked on the Lancet Commission Global Health 2035 and is currently the lead researcher on ethics and equity for the Lancet Global Health Commission on High Quality Health Systems in the SDG Era. Her work focuses on how to strengthen health systems in low- and middle-income countries in order to provide quality care, with an emphasis on reproductive, maternal, newborn and child health.
Dr. Filippa Juul obtained her PhD in Public Health with a concentration in Epidemiology, specializing in nutritional epidemiology, in September 2020. Filippa is originally from Stockholm, Sweden. She completed a Bachelor’s degree in Nutrition and Dietetics at Universidad Autónoma de Madrid in Spain, and thereafter pursued a Master’s degree in Public Health Nutrition at Karolinska Institutet in Stockholm, Sweden. Prior to joining NYU Filippa worked as a researcher at Karolinska Institutet, where her work focused on obesity epidemiology. She also has practical experience of working with public health initiatives, including obesity prevention among young children. Filippa is broadly interested in the impact of nutritional factors on chronic diseases. For her dissertation, Filippa examined the role of food processing in the risk of cardiovascular disease. She is currently holds a position as the Provost’s Postdoctoral Fellow.
Dr. Sooyoung Kim obtained her PhD in Public Health with a concentration in Health Policy and Management in February 2024. She was born and raised in South Korea where she studied Biology as an undergraduate at POSTECH. After working for 4 years in the private sector, she joined the MPH program in French School of Public Health (EHESP) where she developed her interest in economic evaluation of health policies and programs. She has worked in both academic settings and under the United Nations system. Before joining NYU, she worked in the World Health Organization's Health Emergency Programme (WHE) for two years, working on the response to several major outbreaks, including Ebola virus disease, Malaria, and COVID-19. She is interested in exploring how to better respond to infectious disease outbreaks by combining different quantitative methodologies such as mathematical modelling of infectious disease dynamics and economic modelling of the cost-effectiveness of the response operations.
Dr. Sarah Lieff obtained her PhD in public health concentrating in social and behavioral sciences in November 2021. She successfully defending her dissertation entitled "Racial/Ethnic Disparities In The Impacts Of ACA Insurance Coverage Expansions On Mental Health Treatment Among Adults With Mental Health Conditions." Her dissertation examined the impacts of insurance coverage expansions on access, utilization, and quality of mental health care among adults with mental health conditions, and on racial/ethnic disparities.
She previously earned a BA in Psychology from Columbia University and an MPH in Health Behavior from UNC Chapel Hill's Gillings School of Global Public Health. And prior to enrolling at NYU, she led the evaluation of Maimonides Medical Center's Health Home, which aimed to utilize health-enabled IT to integrate care for patients with serious mental illness.
Dr. Zoe Lindenfeld obtained her PhD in public health concentrating in Health Policy and Management in February 2024. She received her BS in Biology and Society from Cornell University’s College of Agriculture and Life Sciences in 2017. She spent two years as a research associate at John Snow Inc. conducting research related to health care delivery and payment reform. Her research interests include value-based payment models and behavioral health, with a particular focus on substance use disorders.
Dr. Jacqueline Litvak obtained her PhD in public health concentrating in epidemiology in March 2023. Her dissertation was entitled "Ultra-Processed Foods in Early Childhood: Determinants and Outcomes in a Low-income Hispanic Population” which highlighted the determinants of early childhood (10 months – 3 years) feeding of ultra-processed foods and associations of ultra-processed foods with child weight outcomes, including standardized growth and overweight statuses.
She is a born and raised Jersey girl who has always dreamed of living in New York City. Jackie received her bachelors of science degree in Neuroscience from Union College, a M.S. in Human Nutrition from Columbia University, and a MPH in Chronic Degree Epidemiology from the Yale School of Public Health. Her research interests focus on the intersection of maternal and child health and nutritional epidemiology. After receiving her PhD, Jackie hopes to pursue a career in academia.
Dr. Patricia McGaughey obtained her PhD in public health in May 2021. A Certified Nurse-Midwife (CNM) with almost 10 years’ experience, Patricia is on the Healthcare Management track of the PhD program. She currently provides intrapartum care at Newark Beth Israel Medical Center. Patricia practiced full-scope midwifery with Brigham and Women’s Hospital in Boston for 7 years and served as interim Director of Midwifery at the hospital. Her clinical and administrative duties covered nine community health centers in the Boston area, as well as an in-hospital adolescent clinic, triage, labor and delivery, and postpartum. Her clinical experience drives her passion for research. Patricia is interested in the connections between quality, safety, leadership and organizational structure. She strives to optimize the organization of women’s healthcare to promote effective care for all women and newborns. She provides clinical teaching and is currently an Adjunct Lecturer in the NYU School of Global Public Health. She holds an MSN from Yale University School of Nursing and a BA in Biology (Spanish Minor) from Eureka College.
Dr. Gabriella Meltzer obtained her PhD in public health concentrating in epidemiology in April 2022. She successfully defended her dissertation entitled "Children’s Risk and Resilience Facing Cumulative Environmental Stress: A Case Study of the 2010 Deepwater Horizon Oil Spill."
Originally hailing from Chicago, Illinois, she graduated from the University of Pennsylvania with her B.A. in Health and Societies, and her undergraduate research examined the public health issue of electronic waste, using Accra, Ghana as a case study. Following graduation, Gabriella worked at the Council on Foreign Relations as a Global Health Research Associate, where she focused on global health governance, pandemic preparedness, and environmental health in China.
Dr. Pricila Mullachery obtained her PhD in Public Health with a concentration in Public Health Policy and Management in September 2018. Her dissertation was entitled “Brazil’s Health Policies 2000-2013: Did they reduce Health Care Inequities?” She currently holds a postdoctoral fellowship at the Urban Health Collaborative at the Drexel University Dornsife School of Public Health. Pricila will be part of NIH-funded study to examine the effects of population density on health outcomes in Latina American and U.S. cities.
Dr. Jamie Murkey obtained his PhD in public health in May 2022. He successfully defended his dissertation defense entitled "Disparities in Cardiovascular Disease Outcomes Examining the Role of Racial Discrimination, Telomere Length, and Allostatic Load." His dissertation developed and applied a cloud-based telomere estimation workflow to generate telomere length from whole-genome sequencing (WGS) data. The telomere length and allostatic load were used to determine if they were independently mediate a relationship between experiences of racial/ethnic discrimination and incident CVD events (myocardial infarction and stroke) and CVD mortality.
Jamie holds a BS in Nutritional Sciences from Pepperdine University and a MPH in Health Policy and Leadership from the Loma Linda University School of Public Health, where he was inducted into the Delta Omega Honorary Society. Prior to New York University, Jamie worked as a research manager at the University of California, Los Angeles on a variety of clinical and behavioral research projects involving the reduction of cardiovascular disease risk factors among HIV/Hepatitis C co-infected patients, HIV prevention using gamification, and an unbiased clinically validated metagenomic Next-Generation Sequencing (mNGS) diagnostic used to detect pathogens in hospitalized patients with infectious diseases. He has also previously worked on other studies concerning marginalized populations within the University of California, San Francisco’s HIV and AIDS Division, RAND Corporation, and City of Pasadena.
Dr. Bridget Murphy obtained her PhD in Public Health with a concentration in epidemiology in March 2023. She is a Registered Dietitian and Certified Diabetes Educator, completing her dietetic internship at Harvard University’s Mount Auburn Hospital in Cambridge, MA, earning a M.S. in Clinical Nutrition and Dietetics from NYU. Bridget has previous work experience in outpatient hospital settings both at NYU and New York Presbyterian hospital. More recently Bridget has worked with the Department of Child and Adolescent Psychiatry at NYU with families of children and adolescents with disordered eating patterns. Her research interests include nutrition, obesity, chronic disease, and wellness.
Dr. Temitope Ojo obtained her PhD in public health concentrating in epidemiology in March 2022. She successfully defended her dissertation entitled "Evaluating the Influence of Context on Feasibility as an Implementation Research Outcome in Low and Middle-Income Countries."
Prior to joining NYU, she received her BA in Biochemistry, with a minor in Anthropology from Mount Holyoke College, South Hadley, MA. She spent three years as a clinical research assistant and fellow, working on chronic kidney disease studies in Boston, MA and Abuja, Nigeria. She went on to receive her MPH in Chronic Disease Epidemiology from the Yale School of Public Health, New Haven, CT.
Dr. Rachael Piltch-Loeb obtained her PhD in Public Health with a concentration in Social and Behavioral Sciences in May 2019. She has been working primarily on influences in intervention receptivity and health decision making during emerging disease events, particularly the Zika virus, disasters, and other adverse events.Her dissertation was entitled "Optimizing Risk Communication in an Emerging Threat: The Impact of Information Seeking Behavior and Information Source on Intervention Receptivity." She currently holds positions as associate research scientist with the Program on Population, Impact, Recovery, and Resilience at NYU GPH and a preparedness fellow at the Harvard T.H Chan School of Public Health Division of Policy Translation and Leadership Development.
Dr. Nessa Ryan obtained her PhD in Public Health with a concentration in Epidemiology in May 2019. Nessa’s research focus is understanding and addressing gender-specific threats to health for women and girls in developing settings through developing and implementing culturally-informed intervention. Nessa is currently the Director of Research for non-profit startup Restore Health, where they are planning a clinical trial of an insertable cup to help women manage urinary incontinence due to obstetric fistula and improve quality of life. She is also a Postdoctoral Fellow at NYU Clinical and Translational Research Institute and Team Lead at ISSE Lab.
Dr. Benjamin Spoer obtained his PhD in Public Health with a concentration in Social and Behavioral Sciences in May 2019. Benjamin is a spatial epidemiologist focusing on how we define exposure in neighborhood studies. He has been working primarily with GPS data and thinking about how we can improve the way we define neighborhoods. His dissertation was entitled, “Built, Food, and Sociodemographic Environments in GPS and Administrative Unit Geographies and their Associations with BMI, Obesity, and Type Two Diabetes.” He is currently the manager of metrics and analytics for the City Health Dashboard at the NYU School of Medicine. The Dashboard provides over 35 different health and health-related metrics at the city and census tract level for the 500 largest cities in the US. You can explore our data at cityhealthdashboard.com.
Dr. Elizabeth Stevens obtained her PhD in Public Health in January 2019. Under the mentorship of Dr. Bernadette Boden-Albala in the Department of Epidemiology, Liz’s research focused on Implementation and Decision Sciences with her dissertation entitled “Advancing The Practice Of Implementation Science: An evaluation of the factors contributing to the use of implementation science in the health research.” Liz is currently performing research evaluating the impact of health policies and interventions to help inform decision makers. She also holds positions as Scientific Director at NYU School of Medicine Section on Tobacco, Alcohol, and Drug Use as well as Research Scientist at NYU School of Medicine Division of Comparative Effectiveness and Decision Science.
Dr. Mahathi Vojjala obtained her PhD in public health with a concentration in Social and Behavioral Sciences in March 2024. She is a 2017 MPH in Epidemiology graduate from New York University School of Global Public Health. Prior to her MPH, Mahathi received a B.A. in religion and public health from Rutgers University. She has been working at the Tobacco Research Lab (TRL) since 2015; Mahathi started as a Research Assistant and was then promoted to Research Lab Manager. After receiving her MPH in 2017, she joined the Tobacco Research Lab full-time as a Junior Research Scientist and Research Coordinator working with Dr. David Abrams and Dr. Ray Niaura. Mahathi’s previous research focused on youth smoking initiation and media advertising, dual and poly use of substances specifically marijuana and cigarettes among young adults, media portrayal of alcohol and tobacco in movie trailers and youth smoking rates, and more recently, use of oral analgesics combined with marijuana, alcohol, and cigarettes among people with chronic pain. Mahathi is primarily interested in research examining alcohol use among youth, and policies and regulations of flavored alcohol products.
Dr. Vivian Wang obtained her PhD in Public Health with a concentration in public health policy and management in January 2024. She is a registered dietitian with research experience in childhood obesity and other diet-related non-communicable diseases worldwide. Vivian holds an M.S. in Nutrition Science from SUNY at Buffalo and an M.P.A. in Health Policy and Management from NYU Wagner. Her research seeks to identify the role of social determinants of health in the health care system. She is particularly interested in drawing methods and theories from different disciplines to inform policy decisions. An amateur cook, Vivian rarely follows recipes and thoroughly enjoys culinary art as an agent to connect with self and others.
Dr. Erica Wood obtained her PhD in Public Health with a concentration in Social and Behavioral Sciences in May 2024. Erica received her B.S. in psychology from the University of Texas at Austin in 2015. In 2017, she graduated with her MPH in Sociomedical Sciences from Columbia University where she became interested in intersectionality and minority stress theory. Erica began working for NYU GPH as a Junior Research Scientist in 2016 for Dr. Stephanie Cook’s Attachment and Health Disparities Lab. Erica continues to work with Dr. Cook on projects examining intersections of different forms of minority stress (e.g., sexual orientation-related discrimination and/or racial/ethnic-related discrimination) and mental and physical health outcomes among sexual minority men of color. Erica’s primary research interests include examining pathways of risk and resilience among racially/ethnically diverse populations of sexual and gender minorities across the life-course.
Dr. Yuan Zhao obtained her PhD in Public Health with a concentration in Epidemiology in May 2024. She is interested in understanding infectious disease prevention and transmission using agent-based modeling and causal inference. Originally from China, she holds a BS in biology from Peking University, a MHS of epidemiology from Johns Hopkins and MPH of biostatistics from Emory University. Her previous research mainly focused on modeling STI and HIV prevention among MSM and treatment of multidrug resistant TB using targeted maximum likelihood estimation (TMLE). She hopes to use statistical and computational approaches to study infectious disease dynamics.