Appendix B

Speaker Biographical Sketches

Otis W. Brawley, M.D., F.A.C.P., is the chief medical officer for the American Cancer Society, where he is responsible for promoting the goals of cancer prevention, early detection, and quality treatment through cancer research and education. He champions efforts to decrease smoking, improve diet, detect cancer at the earliest stage, and provide the critical support cancer patients need. Dr. Brawley currently serves as professor of hematology, oncology, medicine, and epidemiology at Emory University. From April 2001 to November 2007, he was medical director of the Georgia Cancer Center for Excellence at Grady Memorial Hospital in Atlanta, and deputy director for cancer control at Winship Cancer Institute at Emory University. He has also served as a member of the Society’s Prostate Cancer Committee, cochaired the U.S. Surgeon General’s Task Force on Cancer Health Disparities, and filled a variety of capacities at the National Cancer Institute, most recently serving as assistant director. Dr. Brawley is a member of the CDC Advisory Committee on Breast Cancer in Young Women. He was formerly a member of the CDC Breast and Cervical Cancer Early Detection and Control Advisory Committee. He served as a member of the Food and Drug Administration Oncologic Drug Advisory Committee and chaired the NIH Consensus Panel on the Treatment of Sickle Cell Disease. He is listed by Castle Connelly as one of America’s top doctors for cancer. Among numerous other awards, he was a Georgia Cancer Coalition Scholar and received the Key to St. Bernard Parish for his work in the U.S. Public Health Service in the aftermath of Hurricane Katrina. Dr. Brawley is a graduate of University of Chicago, Pritzker School of Medicine. He completed his internship

at University Hospitals of Cleveland, Case Western Reserve University, his residency at University Hospital of Cleveland, and his fellowship at NCI.

Sandra E. Brooks, M.D., M.B.A., is a Phi Beta Kappa and Alpha Omega Alpha (AOA) Medical Honor Society graduate, completed her B.S. and M.D. at Howard University, in Washington, DC; residency in obstetrics and gynecology at the University of Pennsylvania; and Fellowship in Gynecologic Oncology at Brigham and Women’s Hospital, Harvard Medical School. Dr. Brooks completed an M.B.A. at Johns Hopkins University. Dr. Brooks rose to the rank of professor, and has served as Director of the Division of Gynecologic Oncology at the University of Maryland. Dr. Brooks served most recently as an executive with a major health system in Louisville, Kentucky, developing and leading health disparities research, and population health efforts. She currently serves on the volunteer faculty, Public Health–Health Behavior, University of Kentucky. Nationally, she chairs the Clinical Trial Enrollment working group of NRG Oncology, and serves on the Joint Policy Committee and Education Board of the American Public Health Association. In 2011, she was the recipient of the Jewish Hospital and St. Mary’s Foundation Excellence in Community Service award, being one of six Louisville health leaders honored for excellence in leadership, innovation, or service. Dr. Brooks has published extensively, with a current focus on health disparities and health services delivery. She has served as the principal investigator on an NCI National Community Cancer Centers Program award, and on a Gynecologic Oncology Group Clinical Trial focused on clinical trial enrollment.

Barbara Buch, M.D., is a fellowship-trained orthopedic surgeon who came to FDA in 2001. Following residency, Dr. Buch completed an M.B.A. certificate at the Johns Hopkins School of Professional Studies in the Business of Medicine. During her time at FDA, she has worked at all three product centers (Center for Devices and Radiological Health, Center for Drug Evaluation and Research [CDER], and Center for Biologics Evaluation and Research [CBER]), the Office of Policy and the Office of Special Medical Programs in the Office of the Commissioner, with review, research, management, and leadership functions. Her current title is Associate Director for Medicine in the Center Director’s office of FDA’s CBER and she is CBER’s liaison to the FDA’s IRB and International Conference on Harmonization expert working group on clinical investigation of medicinal products in pediatric populations. Most recently she has also been involved with the activities surrounding Food and Drug Administration Safety and Innovation Act (FDASIA) Section 907, which deals with the participation, analysis, and communication of outcomes of demographic subgroups in clinical

trials. She currently chairs FDA’s steering committee for FDASIA section 907 as described in FDA’s 2014 FDASIA section 907 Action Plan.

Jonca Bull, M.D., returned to FDA in August 2012 as the Director of the Office of Minority Health. She serves as a member of the senior staff and advisor to the commissioner, interfacing with all human product centers. Dr. Bull brings extensive public- and private-sector experience in dealing with a range of medical product development and diversity issues to this important position. Dr. Bull previously served in FDA in a variety of positions in both CDER and the Office of the Commissioner spanning 12 years. Dr. Bull returned to FDA after most recently serving as Vice President for U.S. Drug Regulatory Policy at Novartis and, prior to that, as Director of Clinical Regulatory Policy at Genentech. Dr. Bull also previously spent 11 years providing clinical care in a multispecialty group practice, and she currently serves as an Assistant Clinical Professor at George Washington University Medical Center. Dr. Bull is a graduate of Princeton University and received her medical degree from Duke University School of Medicine. She did her postgraduate training at George Washington University, is board certified in ophthalmology, and is a fellow of the American Academy of Ophthalmology.

Moon S. Chen, Jr., Ph.D., M.P.H., is a Professor in the Division of Hematology and Oncology, Department of Internal Medicine, University of California (UC), Davis, School of Medicine; Associate Director for Cancer Control at the UC Davis Comprehensive Cancer Center; and the lead principal investigator of the NCI-funded National Center for Reducing Asian American Cancer Health Disparities, headquartered in Sacramento, California. He previously served on IOM committees that resulted in The Unequal Burden of Cancer: An Assessment of NIH Research and Programs for Ethnic Minorities and the Medically Underserved (1999) and Examining the Health Disparities Research Plan of the National Institutes of Health: Unfinished Business (2006). The American Society of Clinical Oncology highlighted research he led (Chen et al. 2014. Cancer 120:1091-1096), which was selected as one of 2014’s major achievements in clinical cancer research and care and included it in Clinical Cancer Advances 2015: ASCO’s Annual Report on Progress Against Cancer. His presentation to the Academies’ Roundtable on the Promotion of Health Equity and the Elimination of Health Disparities is based in part on this research funded jointly by the National Institute on Minority Health and Health Disparities and NCI.

Jonathan M. Ellen, M.D., is a pediatrician and adolescent medicine specialist who currently is president and vice dean of Johns Hopkins All Children’s Hospital. Dr. Ellen joined the Johns Hopkins University (JHU) School of Medicine in 1999. He was named vice dean for All Children’s Hospital in

2011 and president of All Children’s Hospital in 2012. Dr. Ellen is a professor of pediatrics at the JHU School of Medicine and a professor of epidemiology and population, family, and reproductive health in the Bloomberg School of Public Health. He has trained more than 40 pre- and postdoctoral fellows in adolescent medicine and public health and authored more than 200 peer-reviewed scientific articles, reviews, editorials, and book chapters. After graduating from the University of Pennsylvania, he received his medical degree from Temple University and completed a pediatric residency at Children’s Hospital of Philadelphia. Dr. Ellen completed a fellowship in adolescent medicine at the University of California, San Francisco (UCSF), followed by fellowships in sexually transmitted diseases at UCSF, the San Francisco Department of Public Health, and CDC. He pioneered community-led approach to public health problems as a leader of the Adolescent Medicine Trials Network for HIV/AIDS Intervention, serving as principal investigator for Connect to Protect, a community coalition-based program. He is recognized internationally as an expert on preventing HIV and other infections in adolescents through structural change and has received more than $25 million in research awards from CDC, NIH, and other agencies.

Francisco A. R. García, M.D., M.P.H., is the Director and Chief Medical Officer of the Pima County Health Department in Tucson, Arizona. Pima County is a large government jurisdiction the size of New Hampshire and has a population of nearly a million inhabitants. Dr. García is a member of the U.S. Preventive Services Task Force, which produces national evidence-based clinical guidelines, as well as the Academies’ Roundtable on the Promotion of Health Equity and the Elimination of Health Disparities. Prior to joining Pima County Department of Health, he was a Distinguished Outreach Professor of Public Health and Obstetrics & Gynecology, and served in a variety of roles at the University of Arizona including director of the Center of Excellence in Women’s Health, the Arizona Hispanic Center of Excellence, and the Cancer Disparities Institute of the Arizona Cancer Center.

David Hickam, M.D., M.P.H., is the Program Director of the Clinical Effectiveness Research program at PCORI. He is responsible for developing PCORI’s research program that evaluates comparisons among alternative clinical strategies in a broad range of clinical domains, and he also provides staff support to the PCORI Methodology Committee. Hickam is a specialist in internal medicine and has 30 years of experience as a health services researcher. His past research has focused on strategies for improving health care outcomes among adults with chronic diseases. Hickam previously held the rank of professor in the Department of Medicine at Oregon Health & Science University (OHSU). He also held a joint faculty appointment in

OHSU’s Department of Medical Informatics and Epidemiology. He was a senior investigator in the Oregon Evidence-based Practice Center at OHSU and also served as codirector of the health services research and development program at the Portland Veterans Affairs Medical Center. He has expertise in a broad range of both quantitative and qualitative research methodologies. In 2005, he became the founding director of the John M. Eisenberg Clinical Decisions and Communications Science Center, funded by the Agency for Healthcare Research and Quality. The Eisenberg Center has developed innovative approaches for helping people use evidence-based information to participate in decision making about their health care. Hickam received his B.A. from Stanford University, an M.D. from the University of California, San Francisco, and an M.P.H. from the University of California, Berkeley.

Carol R. Horowitz, M.D., M.P.H., is Associate Professor of Health Policy and Medicine at Mount Sinai School of Medicine, and a practicing general internist. With a focus on using community-based participatory research to address health disparities, she is the principal investigator of several NIH-funded, community-based interventions. She co-founded the Center for Health Equity and Community-Engaged Research, and directs the East Harlem Partnership for Diabetes Prevention, as well as the Community Engagement and Research Core for Mount Sinai’s Institutes for Clinical and Translational Sciences. She has implemented numerous community-based health improvement interventions, and mentors students, residents, and faculty interested in addressing disparities and partnering with communities on research to improve local health and influence policy. She leads the community engagement and diversity activities for the National Human Genome Research Institute-funded U01 grant Biorepositories for Genomic Medicine in Diverse Communities. She is also principal investigator of the NIH/CDC-funded grants and centers on diabetes, obesity, and stroke prevention. Dr. Horowitz is the recipient of numerous awards including the National Leadership Award from the Academy for the Public’s Health; Excellence for Contributions, the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services (HHS); and the Community Service Award, Mount Sinai Medicine. She has an M.D. from Cornell University, and received an M.P.H. from the University of Washington as a Robert Wood Johnson Foundation Clinical Scholar.

Karen E. Kim, M.D., is a professor of medicine at the University of Chicago Medicine. She specializes in the prevention, screening, and early detection of colorectal cancer, hepatitis B, and women’s health issues—particularly functional bowel diseases. She is skilled in the assessment of hereditary colon cancer syndromes and colon cancer risk in families. Dr. Kim’s research

explores chemoprevention for colon cancer and screening methods for populations with average and high risk. Her research interests include underserved and minority populations, understanding health disparities, cultural competency, and cancer prevention. She has also studied the education and awareness of hepatitis B in Asian Americans through screening, advocacy, treatment, and immunization for liver cancer prevention. Dr. Kim received her medical degree from Loyola University Stritch School of Medicine.

Amelie G. Ramirez, Dr.P.H., is an internationally recognized researcher and spokesperson on Latino cancer health disparities, and is a professor of epidemiology and biostatistics at the University of Texas Health Science Center at San Antonio, where she also is founding director of the Institute for Health Promotion Research. She also is associate director of cancer health disparities at the Cancer Therapy and Research Center, a National Cancer Institute Cancer Center. Over the past 30 years, Dr. Ramirez has directed many research programs focused on human and organizational communication to reduce disparities—differences in cancer rates and survival among Latina women compared to white women. Dr. Ramirez directs Redes En Acción, an NCI-funded national Latino cancer research network. Redes and her other projects have led to unique health communication models and interventions that have contributed to reducing Latino cancer rates and increasing Latino screening, clinical trial participation, and healthy lifestyles. She also has helped pioneer the use of bilingual, bicultural patient navigators and promotoras to erase Latinas’ lag times between an abnormal cancer screening and confirmatory diagnosis and treatment initiation, while also increasing Latina survivors’ access to support services. Dr. Ramirez also mentors Latino students and fellows, contributes to the scientific literature, and serves on several journal editorial boards. Dr. Ramirez has received many awards for her work to reduce cancer disparities, including 2007 election to the National Academy of Medicine. She is a member of the Scientific Advisory Board, Susan G. Komen for the Cure; Scientific Advisory Board, Avon Foundation Breast Cancer Crusade; and Board of Directors, Lance Armstrong Foundation. She also is the former chairperson of CDC’s Breast and Cervical Cancer Early Detection and Control Advisory Committee. Dr. Ramirez received M.P.H. and Dr.P.H. degrees from the University of Texas Health Science Center at Houston School of Public Health.

Charles Rotimi, Ph.D., is a genetic epidemiologist with substantial training in genomics, biochemistry, statistics, and health disparities research. He is the Chief of the Metabolic, Cardiovascular, and Inflammatory Disease Genomics Branch and the Director of the Center for Research on Genomics and Global Health in the National Human Genome Research Institute, NIH. His lab conducts genomic and epidemiologic studies that explore the

patterns and determinants of metabolic disorders with particular emphasis on disease etiology and health disparities in African ancestry populations. His team published the first genomewide scan for hypertension and blood pressure in African Americans and for type 2 diabetes in West Africans. His lab contributes to the development of global genomic resources including the International Haplotype Mapping project, the 1000 Genome, and the African Genome Variation Project. He is a member of the Executive and Scientific Committee for the International Federation of Human Genetics Societies and the Human Genome Organization (HUGO) Council. He is the founding president of the African Society of Human Genetics (AfSHG). He successfully led the establishment of the Human Heredity and Health in Africa (H3Africa) initiative with more than $76 million commitment from NIH and Wellcome Trust. H3Africa is creating a pan-African network of labs that is conducting leading-edge research into the determinants of diseases in Africans. He is on the editorial board of several professional journals including Clinical Genetics and Genome Medicine. He was recently awarded an Honorary Professorship in the Division of Human Genetics, University of Cape Town, South Africa, and received the Gold Scientific Achievement Award from the South African Medical Research Council Scientific Merit Awards in recognition of excellence in research.

Teshia G. Arambula Solomon, Ph.D., is Associate Professor in the Department of Family and Community Medicine in the College of Medicine at the University of Arizona. She was appointed Codirector of the Native American Research and Training Center (NARTC) in June 2007. She has more than 18 years of experience in health-related research and training involving Native American students in public health. She is principal investigator and Director of the Faculty and Student Research Development program of the American Indian Research Centers for Health (AIRCH5) as well as Director of the Research Core. She serves as coinvestigator and Codirector of the Native American Cancer Program research training initiative and as a coinvestigator on the community outreach component with the Arizona Cancer Center. As coinvestigator for the Arizona Study Center of the National Children’s Study (HHS Eunice Kennedy Shriver National Institute of Child Health and Human Development), she is responsible for the tribal community engagement component. She is a founding member and past cochair of the Native Research Network, Inc. She previously served as the Director of the Southern Plains Inter-Tribal Epidemiology Center at the Oklahoma City Area Inter-Tribal Health Board. She has been a fellow at Northwest Portland Indian Health Board, Native American Research Centers for Health, and a National Center for Minority Health and Health Disparities Scholar. She has published research in cervical cancer prevention and control and is a co-author of two papers in the 2008 supplement

to Cancer on American Indian and Alaska Native cancer. She is currently editing a book on the ethical conduct of research in Native American communities. Dr. Solomon has mentored students as a faculty member for more than 10 years and has promoted research development by pursuing and providing funds for students to attend the annual American Public Health Association meeting and the annual Native Health Research conference. She has mentored more than 20 graduate public health students.

Connie M. Ulrich, Ph.D., R.N., F.A.A.N., is an Associate Professor of Bioethics and Nursing in the Department of Biobehavioral Health Sciences, University of Pennsylvania School of Nursing. Dr. Ulrich also holds a secondary appointment in the Department of Medical Ethics and Health Policy in the Perelman School of Medicine and is the Associate Director of the New Courtland Center for Transitions and Health at the University of Pennsylvania School of Nursing. Currently, she also serves as the Graduate Group Director of Ph.D. Studies at the School of Nursing (2014–2016). Dr. Ulrich received her undergraduate and graduate degrees from the Catholic University of America and her Ph.D. with a concentration in nursing ethics from the University of Maryland, Baltimore. She was the first nurse to be awarded a 2-year postdoctoral fellowship in bioethics at NIH where she received training in both clinical and research ethics. Her publications in clinical ethics focus on clinician moral distress, ethics education, and patient–provider communication. Her research ethics publications include work on the risks and benefits in cancer clinical trials and how cancer patients view their research participation, respondent burden in research, informed consent, international ethical issues, and scientific integrity. She is the recipient of funding from various organizations, including NIH (National Institutes of Nursing Research), the Pennsylvania Health Research Formula Funds Research Grant/Oncology Nursing Society, the Robert Wood Johnson Foundation Future of Nurse Scholars program, and others. Dr. Ulrich is currently the lead cochair of the Bioethics Expert Panel, American Academy of Nursing, of which she reestablished in 2013. She also currently serves on several data and safety monitoring boards appointed by NIH. Dr. Ulrich is the editor of Nursing Ethics in Everyday Practice. Dr. Ulrich is an elected fellow of the American Academy of Nursing and a Salzburg Global Fellow.

Jocelyn B. Ulrich, M.P.H., R.A.C., is Senior Director of Scientific and Regulatory Affairs at PhRMA, where she supports PhRMA’s policy advocacy strategies on clinical trials and innovative biologics and biosimilars. Prior to joining PhRMA, Ms. Ulrich held positions of increasing responsibility at Pfizer and Human Genome Sciences in clinical research management and medical affairs. From 2011 to 2013 Ms. Ulrich led the Investigator-Initiated

and Sponsored Research Association’s (IISRA’s) Collaboration Forum, a cross-functional group that aims to establish best practices for research conducted in partnership with industry and the NCI-funded Cooperative Groups. Ms. Ulrich also served as chair of the Membership and Outreach subcommittee of the Mid-Atlantic Women in Science Committee in the Healthcare Businesswomen’s Association (HBA) Mid-Atlantic Chapter from 2012 to 2014. She received her M.P.H. in Global Health Policy and Management from New York University.

Antonia M. Villarruel, Ph.D., R.N., F.A.A.N., is Professor and the Margaret Bond Simon Dean of Nursing at the University of Pennsylvania School of Nursing. Internationally renowned for her leadership in policy, practice, and research, Dr. Villarruel is a former board member of the American Academy of Nursing, was elected to the National Academy of Medicine in 2007, and currently serves as chair on the Institute of Medicine Roundtable on the Promotion of Health Equity and the Elimination of Health Disparities. Prior to becoming dean, Dr. Villarruel was a professor, the Nola J. Pender Collegiate Chair, and the associate dean for research and global affairs at the University of Michigan School of Nursing. She also held a joint faculty appointment in the School of Public Health and was director of the school’s World Health Organization Collaborating Center for Research and Clinical Training in Health Promotion Nursing. Her current research projects include sexual risk reduction interventions for Latino and Mexican youth, parent–adolescent communication interventions to prevent teen pregnancy and sexually transmitted diseases, the use of virtual environments to train community participants to implement evidence-based interventions, and language learning to promote global health competency in undergraduate nurses. Dr. Villarruel earned her M.S.N. at Penn’s School of Nursing and served as an assistant professor at the School from 1995 to 2000 and as an adjunct professor from 2005 to 2011. She has co-authored a number of papers with Penn faculty, led the 2012 Office of Nursing Science Colloquium on Health Promotion and Risk Reduction Practices in Latina Populations at the school, and created and led the school’s study abroad program in Oaxaca, Mexico. Dr. Villarruel is the recipient of numerous awards and honors, and was also inducted in the Michigan Nurses Hall of Fame in 2004.

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