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Committee Member Biographical Sketches
James A. Merchant, M.D., Dr.P.H. (Chair) is Dean of the College of Public Health and Professor of Occupational and Environmental Health and Internal Medicine at the University of Iowa. His research interests focus on the epidemiology of occupational lung diseases, particularly organic dust-induced lung disease; rural health and injuries; occupational/environmental health care delivery models; occupational health policy; and international rural and environmental health. Dr. Merchant’s committee assignments include the National Advisory Committee for Occupational Safety and Health of the DOL and DHHS, the Board of Scientific Counselors of NIOSH, the Advisory Committee to the Director of the CDC, the IOM Committee to Assess Occupational Safety and Health Training Needs, and the IOM Roundtable on Environmental Health Sciences, Research, and Medicine. Dr. Merchant received his M.D. from the University of Iowa in 1966 and Dr.P.H. in epidemiology from the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill in 1973. He is a member of the Institute of Medicine.
Martín J. Sepúlveda, M.D. (Vice-Chair) is Vice President of Global Well-being Services & Global Health Benefits for the IBM Corporation. His research interests include health information privacy reform, health promotion programs and risk reduction program measurement, value-based health care purchasing, and global occupational health services delivery. He is a fellow of the American College of Physicians, the American College of Occupational and Environmental Medicine, and the American College of Preventive Medicine. Dr. Sepúlveda was recently awarded the
Distinguished Alumnus Award for Professional Achievement by the University of Iowa, and his team has achieved numerous national and international awards in occupational health & safety. He serves on the Board of Directors of the Employee Benefits Research Institute, the Board of Advisors to the School of Public Health at the University of Iowa, the Board of the National Business Group on Health, and is a member of the Wye River Group on Healthcare. He received his M.D. and M.P.H. degrees from Harvard University, completed internal medicine residency at the University of California Hospital & Clinics, and occupational medicine residency at NIOSH, CDC.
Ann M. Coulston, M.S., R.D. is a Clinical Development Associate with Eli Lilly and Company, working with the obesity drug development program. Ms. Coulston has a more than 20-year history of clinical research at Stanford University Medical Center where her research is centered on the nutritional management of diabetes and insulin resistance. She is a Registered Dietitian, a Fellow of the American Dietetic Association, and a past-president of the American Dietetic Association. The American Dietetic Association Foundation has recognized her for Excellence in the Practice of Clinical Nutrition and in the Practice of Research. Ms. Coulston holds membership in the American Diabetes Association, the American Society for Nutritional Sciences, and the North American Association for the Study of Obesity. Ms. Coulston received her M.S. in nutritional science from Cornell University in 1972.
Dee W. Edington, Ph.D. is a Professor of Movement Science in the Division of Kinesiology and a Research Scientist in the Health Management Research Center at the University of Michigan. Dr. Edington studies the relationships between individual health behaviors and future health care utilization and costs for both individuals and organizations. His research focuses on the health behaviors of individuals such as physical inactivity, overweight, smoking, high blood pressure, and high cholesterol. He is interested in how these health behaviors and risks interact to result in poor health status and future increased utilization of the health care system. He is a member of the American Academy of Kinesiology and Physical Education, and the Society of the Sigma Xi. Dr. Edington received his Ph.D. in Physical Education from the Michigan State University in 1968.
Pamela A. Hymel, M.D., M.P.H. is Senior Vice President and Corporate Medical Director for Sedgwick CMS. She is former Vice President of Medical Services and Benefits at Hughes Electronics, Inc. In her 16 years of employment with Hughes Electronics, Dr. Hymel was instrumental in the development of WorkWell, an integrated wellness program designed to
address modifiable risk behavior for employees in Hughes’ self-funded medical program focused on reducing health care costs before they happen. Dr. Hymel is a Fellow of the American College of Occupational and Environmental Medicine (ACOEM) and under her leadership, Hughes was awarded the ACOEM Corporate Health Achievement Award and the C. Everett Koop Award Honorable Mention. Dr. Hymel received her M.D. from Louisiana State University.
J. Richard Jennings, Ph.D. is a Professor in the Department of Psychiatry and Psychology in the Western Psychiatric Institute and Clinic at the University of Pittsburgh. His research interests are in the areas of cognitive psychophysiology, brain imaging, cardiovascular functioning and aging. He has published research on the influence of sleep deprivation on processes of supervisory attention, autoregulation of blood pressure and thought, and cardiovascular reactivity associated with atherosclerosis. Dr. Jennings is a member and past-president of the American Psychosomatic Society and the Society for Psychophysiological Research and a Fellow of the American Psychological Association. Dr. Jennings received his Ph.D. from the University of California-Berkeley in 1969.
Tom B. Leamon, Ph.D. is a Vice President of Liberty Mutual Insurance Group and Director of the Liberty Mutual Research Institute for Safety. Dr. Leamon is responsible for the research program in occupational safety and rehabilitation and has published research on integrated approaches to occupational injury and illness, industrial ergonomics, and evaluation of criteria for the prevention of low back pain disability. He also serves as a Lecturer on Environmental Health at the Harvard School of Public Health and is a term member of the NORA liaison committee of the National Institute of Occupational Safety and Health. Dr. Leamon is a Fellow of the Ergonomics Society, Human Factors and Ergonomics Society, and the Institution of Electrical Engineers (U.K.). He is a board certified Professional Ergonomist, a Chartered Engineer (U.K.), and a European Engineer. Dr. Leamon received his Ph.D. in Industrial Engineering from the Institute of Technology, Cranfield.
Rebecca M. Mullis, Ph.D., R.D. is Professor and Department Head of Foods and Nutrition at the University of Georgia. Her research interests include developing intervention approaches for individuals, groups, and populations. Her areas of interest include both clinical and community-based programs for chronic disease risk reduction and health promotion. Dr. Mullis is particularly interested in policy and environmental approaches to reducing cardiovascular disease. Dr. Mullis serves on the USDA Food and Consumer Service Expert Round Table, and is a member
of the Shape Up America Campaign Advisory Council. She is also spokesperson for the American Heart Association’s Heart Check Program. She is a Registered Dietitian and received her Ph.D. in Interdisciplinary Home Economics from the University of Tennessee in 1976.
Michael D. Parkinson, M.D., M.P.H. is Executive Vice President and Chief Health and Medical Officer at Lumenos. He is responsible for oversight and integration of consumer, patient, provider, and purchaser strategies to identify, promote, and deliver high quality health programs and health care. Dr. Parkinson has published in the areas of screening and preventive health care services and reimbursement for preventive care. He is President-Elect of the American College of Preventive Medicine, a Fellow of the American College of Preventive Medicine, the former Vice Chair of the American Board of Preventive Medicine, and member of the Armed Forces Epidemiological Board. Dr. Parkinson is a retired Colonel of the U.S. Air Force. He serves on the editorial boards of the American Journal of Medical Quality and the American Journal of Preventive Medicine. Dr. Parkinson received his M.D. from George Washington University in 1979 and M.P.H. from Johns Hopkins School of Hygiene and Public Health in 1987.
Claudia K. Probart, Ph.D. is Associate Professor of Nutrition at the Pennsylvania State University. In her work at Penn State, Dr. Probart has explored a variety of innovative delivery systems for nutrition education. Her research interests include the psychosocial aspects of food decision-making behavior, nutrition and health marketing theory and practice, gender issues in consumer nutrition behavior, nutrition and health communication for special population groups, and worksite nutrition intervention for cancer risk reduction. Dr. Probart serves as director of the International Program in Nutrition at Penn State. She is a technical editor of the Food, Nutrition, and Agriculture Journal and a reviewer for the Journal of the American Dietetic Association, the American Journal of Health Promotion, and others. She is a member of the American Institute of Nutrition, the American Dietetic Association, and the American Society for Clinical Nutrition. Dr. Probart is a Registered Dietitian and received her Ph.D. from the University of Oregon in 1987.
Nicolaas P. Pronk, Ph.D. is Vice President of the HealthPartners Center for Health Promotion. He is also a Research Investigator in the HealthPartners Research Foundation, where he serves as co-director of the Population Health Unit. In this role, he conducts studies in the areas of behavior change, population health improvement and the impact of systems-level change on health-related outcomes. Dr. Pronk has a broad
background in exercise science and behavioral medicine. He has published extensively in the areas of exercise and physical activity, behavior change and the integration of health risk management strategies in population health initiatives. He currently serves on the Editorial Boards for American College of Sports Medicine (ACSM) Health and Fitness Journal, Disease Management & Health Outcomes, and the e-journal Preventing Chronic Disease. Dr. Pronk is a member of the NIDDK’s Clinical Obesity Research Panel (CORP) at the National Institutes of Health. He has also served on the Translation Advisory Committee for Diabetes Prevention and Control Programs at the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention in Atlanta. He is a Fellow of the ACSM. Dr. Pronk received his Ph.D. in Exercise Physiology in 1992 from Texas A&M University, and completed a Postdoctoral Research Fellowship in Behavioral Medicine at the University of Pittsburgh School of Medicine.
Glorian Sorenson, Ph.D., M.P.H. is a Professor in the Department of Society, Human Development and Health at the Harvard School of Public Health and is Director of the Center for Community-Based Research at the Dana-Farber Cancer Institute. Her research interests include worksite-and community-based studies that test the effectiveness of theory-driven interventions targeting individual and organizational change. Her research has focused particularly on the health of workers, with a focus on cancer prevention, including tobacco control, diet and physical activity, as well as occupational health and safety. She has conducted studies in worksites as well as in collaboration with labor unions. Her research team conducted the first randomized controlled worksite intervention trials to integrate messages on occupational health and health behaviors and was instrumental in conducting the first randomized trials to integrate messages on occupational health and health behaviors.