Meet Our Experts

Rima Afifi engages in public health research and practice with intent to promote social, community, and policy environments conducive to wellbeing. Whenever possible, she uses methods of Community Based Participatory Research; applies an ecological lens to the understanding of the issues; engages multiple disciplines to widen the perspectives on any topic; and emphasizes knowledge transfer of research to practice and policy. She is specifically interested in intervention and implementation science. Most of Rima’s research and practice has centered on adolescent and youth health and wellbeing, as well as on the Arab world. This has infused her research and practice with critical reflections on the impact of global politics, economics, trade; and of war, conflict and contexts of uncertainty; as well as the power of youth agency and voice. A secondary area of research emphasis has been tobacco control, specifically the global epidemic of hookah use. Using the Framework Convention on Tobacco Control as a guidance document, her research has explored determinants of use, as well as policy solutions to minimize the morbidity and mortality burden of this alternative tobacco product.

Sarah Birken, PhD, is an Assistant Professor in the Department of Health Policy and Management at the Gillings School of Global Public Health, Director of the Program on Implementation and Organization Research (PrIOR) at the Cecil G. Sheps Center for Health Services Research, and an Associate Member of Lineberger Comprehensive Cancer Center at the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill. Her research focuses on translating evidence into practice, including middle managers’ role in implementing evidence-based practices, implementing innovations in cancer care, and selecting and applying implementation theories. Dr. Birken’s research has been funded by the Agency for Healthcare Research and Quality, the Cancer Research Network, the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, and the National Cancer Institute. She serves as a National Institutes of Health Center for Scientific Review Early Career Reviewer and Core Faculty in the Dissemination and Implementation Science Methods Unit of the North Carolina Translational & Clinical Sciences Institute. She has served as an expert speaker for organizations such as the National Cancer Survivorship Resource Center, the Veterans Affairs Center for Clinical Management Research, the Center for Disease Prevention and Control’s National Comprehensive Cancer Control Program Directors, and the American Society of Clinical Oncology’s Survivorship Committee.

Jan Eberth is an Associate Professor in the Department of Epidemiology and Biostatistics at the University of South Carolina and the Deputy Director of the SC Rural Health Research Center. Dr. Eberth received her PhD from the University of Texas School Of Public Health and a postdoctoral fellowship from MD Anderson Cancer Center. The focus of her research is cancer health disparities, particularly socioeconomic and structural barriers that impede access and utilization to cancer screening and treatment. She is the co-chair of the CPCRN Rural Cancer Workgroup.

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Dr. Reuland is a professor of medicine at the University of North Carolina in the Division of General Medicine and Clinical Epidemiology. He attended medical school at Johns Hopkins University and did his internal medicine residency at Yale—New Haven Hospital. He practiced and taught internal medicine for 11 years (including 4 years with the U.S. Indian Health Service) before deciding to focus on research and enter a post-doctoral fellowship at the UNC Cecil G. Sheps Center for Health Services Research. He completed the fellowship and MPH degree at the UNC Gillings School of Global Public Health in 2008, after which he rejoined the UNC faculty as a health services researcher. His research interests include developing, testing, and implementing interventions aimed at improving clinical communication, decision making, and health behaviors within primary care practice and health systems. Much of his work aims to enhance our understanding of how to make cancer screening more appropriate, patient-centered, and effective.

His primary areas of inquiry are in cancer prevention and control, though he collaborates on studies in other disease areas. He is currently principal investigator of a multi-site, clinical trial funded by an American Cancer Society Research Scholar Grant testing a colorectal cancer screening intervention in safety net care settings in North Carolina and New Mexico. He recently led a multi-disciplinary effort to develop policies, processes, and tools needed for appropriate implementation of lung cancer screening within the UNC Health Care System, and he is PI on intramural (pilot) research grants to develop and test lung cancer screening decision support tools. Dr. Reuland was recently appointed Director of the Carolina Cancer Screening Initiative, supported by the UNC Lineberger Comprehensive Cancer Center and University Cancer Research Fund, which focuses on improving the delivery of evidence-based cancer screening in NC.

Jackilen Shannon is the Director of the Integrated Program in Community Research, Director of OHSU’s Clinical and Translational Science Award (CTSA) Community and Collaboration Core and Director of Community-Engaged Research at the Knight Cancer Institute. Her research program has three areas of focus. First, her work in nutritional and molecular epidemiology focuses on the impact of environmental risk factors, primarily dietary intake, on the early development of disease. This research also expands into the broader role of metabolic factors, including obesity and fat distribution on disease risk. Additionally, she contributes methodologic expertise in the development and conduct of observational studies, including case-control and cohort studies and clinical trials. Second, she developed and expanded an education and research program, Let’s Get Healthy!, that provides personalized health education to school children and adults through an interactive health fair. This program supports the development and maintenance of a population-based anonymous data repository for academic and community use while also providing tailored, community-friendly feedback about individuals’ multiple cancer risk factors, including dietary intake and body composition while also offering specific information on risky behaviors for skin and lung cancer. Finally, as an epidemiologist, her work has largely utilized population based methodologies, with a long-term goal of translation to the community and policy. To this end, she has worked toward developing a formal mechanism for working collaboratively with community groups and hospital systems in Central Oregon and the North Coast region to bring the power of academic research to community level decision-making. The result of this work has been the establishment of Research Coalitions which employ a liaison who works closely with community leaders to identify areas of research need, and with academic institutions to identify investigators able to assist.

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Dr. Erika Trapl is an Assistant Professor in the Department of Population and Quantitative Health Sciences at Case Western Reserve University. She is Associate Director of the Prevention Research Center for Healthy Neighborhoods and PI of the CWRU Cancer Prevention and Control Research Network Collaborating Center. Dr. Trapl is trained as an epidemiologist and has been conducting health behavior intervention research for over 15 years. Her work currently focuses on understanding and addressing the influence of the physical and social environment on lifestyle risk factors such as diet and tobacco use through policy, systems, and environmental change approaches, with a particular focus on health equity and disparities. Dr. Trapl has applied classical epidemiological methods to understand the characteristics, risk factors, and correlates of adolescent and young adult tobacco use in order to develop successful tobacco prevention and cessation interventions. She is also conducting a study exploring the use of the 2-1-1 help line to promote smoking cessation among low-income smokers.

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Dr. Vanderpool is an Associate Professor in the Department of Health, Behavior & Society at the University of Kentucky College of Public Health. Robin also serves as Principal Investigator of the CDC-funded Appalachian Center for Cancer Education, Screening, and Support (ACCESS), which is a collaborating site of the Cancer Prevention and Control Research Network. Dr. Vanderpool is also co-investigator with the CDC-funded UK Rural Cancer Prevention Center (RCPC), a Prevention Research Center, and co-director of the UK Markey Cancer Center’s Behavioral and Community-Based Research Shared Resource Facility. Robin’s professional interests include cancer health disparities among rural and Appalachian populations, HPV vaccination and cancer screening, dissemination and implementation research, and cancer survivorship. She received her Doctorate of Public Health from the University of Kentucky.

Cynthia A. Vinson, PhD, MPA is a Senior Adviser for the Implementation Science Team in the Office of the Director in the Division of Cancer Control and Population Sciences (DCCPS) at the National Cancer Institute (NCI). Dr. Vinson works on building and sustaining the field of implementation science in order to enhance the integration of evidence-based guidelines, programs, and policies for cancer control in public health and clinical practice. Dr. Vinson leads dissemination and implementation research training activities including the annual Training Institute for Dissemination and Implementation (D&I) Research in Health. She is responsible for working both within NCI and with other agencies and organizations at the international, national, state and local level to translate research funded by DCCPS into practice.

Dr. Vinson came to the DCCPS as a Presidential Management Fellow and spent three years rotating in various office across NCI including science planning, legislation and communication. Prior to working at NCI, Dr. Vinson was a Peace Corps Volunteer in Gabon where she served as a health educator. Dr. Vinson was also previously a supervisor at the Kern County Department of Human Services in California. Dr. Vinson holds a doctoral degree in Public Administration and Health Policy from George Washington University, a master in public administration/international development from Rutgers, the State University of New Jersey and a bachelor’s degree in political science from California State University, Bakersfield.

Dr. Wheeler is Associate Professor with tenure in the Department of Health Policy and Management at the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill. She is the Principal Investigator leading the national, multisite, NCI- and CDC-funded Cancer Prevention and Control Research Network Coordinating Center, which focuses on dissemination and implementation of evidence-based cancer-focused interventions. She also is PI of the NCI-funded Cancer Care Quality Training Program at UNC and Co-Director of the NCI-funded Geographic Management of Cancer Health Disparities Program, Region 1 South. Dr. Wheeler’s research is focused on understanding and improving cancer care quality, access, equity, and value. Her work has examined the comparative effectiveness of colorectal cancer screening interventions in vulnerable populations, disparities in endocrine therapy use among early stage breast cancer patients, financial toxicity of cancer treatment, and comparative and cost effectiveness of various treatments, technologies, and policies across clinical domains. Her work has resulted in more than 80 peer-reviewed publications and more than 100 presentations at national conferences, symposia, and other public venues. Dr. Wheeler is fully funded on externally-sponsored grants and contracts from the NCI, CDC, American Cancer Society, National Comprehensive Cancer Network, and Susan G Komen for the Cure.

Dr. Williams is the Chief Technology Officer of the Cancer Prevention and Control Research Network, where she has honed her skills in designing online collaboration tools and custom-built data collection tools, including software development and online survey development. Her strong history of research productivity led to her becoming the first ever non-professor awarded a full membership in the University of North Carolina Lineberger Comprehensive Cancer Center.

Since 1999, Dr. Williams has conducted Tobacco Control policy research at UNC with a focus on new media, including studying online sales, marketing, and usage trends in tobacco products, leading the NCI and FDA Center for Tobacco Products-funded Internet Tobacco Vendors Study, which includes extensive surveillance of the online retail environment for tobacco, evaluating the implementation and impact of state and federal policies on the industry’s practices, with a focus on issues such as tax evasion, youth access prevention, and emerging products like e-cigarettes.

Dr. Williams is the nation’s leading expert in the study of online tobacco marketing, leading the first, the largest, and the longest running study of Internet tobacco sales, and developing cutting edge research methodology and proprietary applications for web content analysis, data collection, online surveys, and social media analysis. Her research has had (and continues to have) a strong impact on informing state and federal policy surrounding Internet tobacco sales and marketing, going beyond publications to congressional briefings, presentations to the NIH and FDA Tobacco Regulatory Science Program, and to the National Association of Attorneys General, with whom she is collaborating to develop regulatory compliance assessment and enforcement programs for Internet E-cigarette Vendors.