Epidemiology Research Branch

Contacts

Yonette Thomas, Ph.D.
Branch Chief
(301) 402-1910

Dr. Thomas is a medical sociologist/social epidemiologist, with postgraduate training in demography and epidemiology. Before NIDA, Dr. Thomas served as a study director at the National Academy of Sciences/National Research Council and held teaching and research faculty positions at American University and Howard University. Dr. Thomas' primary and secondary research included HIV/AIDS risk and prevention behavior among minority women, implications of underlying versus multiple-cause of death for preventive health behavior using the 1986 National Mortality Follow Back Survey, migration patterns and the spread of disease in particular HIV/AIDS, the impact of media on health and illness behavior, self-medication, and self care, and issues affecting social bonds between the aged and their families. In addition, process and impact evaluations of research demonstration projects focusing on family support, youth opportunities, high-risk youth, and communities at risk, including ethnographic surveys and qualitative fieldwork. Her research interests are the social epidemiology of drug abuse and HIV/AIDS, gene-environment interactions, and the effects of cumulative disadvantage on health behavior. Dr. Thomas' program area covers: Effect of cumulative disadvantage at the individual, family (including biologic and genetic), and community level on risk and protection; intergenerational effects, including gene-environment interactions; long-term consequences of poor health behaviors, drug abuse and HIV; Role of social contexts (e.g., family and households, religious institutions, work places, neighborhoods and communities, geographic location, residential segregation) in drug abuse and HIV risk and protection; Mechanisms through which social integration/cohesion and exclusion, social interactions, collective efficacy protect against, moderate, mitigate intergenerational persistence of drug abuse and related behaviors; and Drug abuse and HIV risk among older adults, minority women in particular; intersection of biology, chronic disease, and drug abuse.

Kathy Etz, Ph.D.
Social Science Analyst
(301) 402-1749

Dr. Etz is the Director of the Program on Human Development in Adolescence and Early Adulthood in the Epidemiology Research Branch, Division of Epidemiology, Services, and Prevention Research at the National Institute on Drug Abuse. Dr. Etz received her Ph.D. in Human Development from the University of North Carolina, Greensboro in 1997. Dr. Etz's program area at NIDA covers developmental research that explores: 1) the impact of biopsychosocial processes on drug abuse during multiple life transitions, 2) how new roles and behaviors adopted in emerging developmental stages influence patterns of drug abuse, and 3) the role of different systems and factors (e.g. family, peers, pubertal transitions) in drug abuse patterns and transitions.

Peter Hartsock, Dr.P.H.
Research Scientist Officer
(301) 402-1964

Dr. Peter Hartsock is a Captain in the U.S. Public Health Service. He has many years of experience at NIDA, with expertise in epidemiological and prevention research on drug abuse and HIV/AIDS. He currently serves as Research Scientist Officer and Program Official in NIDA's Epidemiology Research Branch, where he provides technical assistance and guidance to potential research grantees and to federal and international agencies. Since the AIDS epidemic began nearly 25 years ago, Dr. Hartsock has dedicated himself to facilitating a successful program of research in mathematical modeling of HIV and other infectious diseases, molecular epidemiology, and innovative methods in the behavioral and social sciences to characterize HIV/AIDS and other emerging and re-emerging diseases associated with drug abuse. Most recently, Dr. Hartsock has been instrumental in advancing the science of mathematical modeling efforts to determine the public health impact and cost effectiveness of making HIV testing and counseling routine in medical and clinical settings. Dr. Hartsock served with Dr. C. Everett Koop as a co-author on the Surgeon General's Report on AIDS and was awarded the Surgeon General's Exemplary Service Medal for this and related work. Dr. Hartsock has also developed a large portfolio of international research on drug abuse, HIV/AIDS, and related problems. Part of this work includes the former Soviet Union where AIDS is spreading faster than anywhere else on earth and where drug abuse is the principal driver of the epidemic. Dr. Hartsock serves on a number of advisory groups including the federal Interagency Arctic Research Policy Committee, the UNAIDS Task Force on AIDS in the Military, and the Committees on AIDS of the Center for Strategic and International Studies, the Council on Foreign Relations, and the Atlantic Council.

Elizabeth Lambert, M.Sc.
Health Statistician
(301) 402-1933

Ms. Lambert holds a Masters of Science in psychology, and has been with NIDA for nearly 20 years. Her research portfolio is concentrated in the behavioral and social sciences, with an emphasis on drug abuse and HIV/AIDS, HIV-related co-infections (such as hepatitis C), hepatitis B, and other sexually transmitted diseases. Her current research program areas focus on (1) identifying new theoretical approaches to understand the natural history/epidemiology, progression, and health and social outcomes of drug abuse and infectious diseases, with an emphasis on HIV/AIDS; (2) understanding intrapersonal, behavioral, social, and environmental factors and their interactions with genetic factors to influence drug abuse and HIV-related risk behaviors; and (3) facilitating the translation of epidemiological research on drug abuse and HIV/AIDS into prevention interventions, health services, and public health practice. Ms. Lambert also serves as Program Official for epidemiology research grants on drug abuse and HIV/AIDS among men who have sex with men; acute HIV infection; drug abuse and behavioral correlates of drug-resistant HIV; HIV and HCV co-infections among drug users; behavioral, social, and molecular epidemiological research on drug abuse and HIV/AIDS; studies of the behavioral and social epidemiology of non-injecting drug use and its role in the spread of HIV/AIDS; social network research on drug abuse and HIV/AIDS transmission patterns; and methodological research in the behavioral and social sciences to improve epidemiological measures and methods for drug abuse and HIV/AIDS research.

Marsha Lopez, Ph.D.
Health Scientist Administrator
(301) 402-1846

Dr. Lopez joined the Epidemiology Research Branch, Division of Epidemiology, Services, and Prevention Research at the National Institute on Drug Abuse in 2006. Her program areas include major epidemiologic studies, studies of the co-occurrence of drug and other psychiatric disorders, and etiologic studies examining the vulnerability to drug use and abuse and how it varies according to context. After receiving her B.A. in Psychology from Georgetown University Dr. Lopez was an Intramural Research Training Associate (IRTA) Fellow at NIDA for two years in Behavioral Pharmacology in the Preclinical Pharmacology Laboratory. She subsequently attended the Johns Hopkins University School of Hygiene and Public Health, Department of Mental Hygiene, where she received her MHS with a concentration in Public Mental Health, and then Ph.D. with a focus on drug and alcohol dependence epidemiology. Her training was funded by an Individual National Research Service Award (NRSA) from NIDA, supporting research on drug related mortality. Prior to coming to DESPR, Dr. Lopez spent time at the Center for Substance Abuse Research (CESAR) at the University of Maryland and led a team at Walter Reed Army Medical Center conducting medical surveillance on the United States Military population.

Moira O'Brien, M.Phil.
Health Scientist Administrator
(301) 402-1881

Ms. O'Brien is Program Director, Research on Emerging and Current Trends (REACT). She has 15 years of experience in the substance abuse field and has been with NIDA for 12 years where she worked in the International Program, Office of the Director, prior to joining the Epidemiology Research Branch. During her time at NIDA, Ms. O'Brien has been responsible for developing and collaborating on a number of international activities in the area of epidemiology pertaining to training, research development, and the promotion of methods and mechanisms for the collection and sharing of internationally comparable and culturally appropriate drug abuse data. Her current responsibilities include stimulating and overseeing an extramural grant program of research on emerging and current drug abuse trends, including studies to: characterize the nature and extent of emerging and current drug abuse trends within local, national, and international contexts, and identify associated health, social, and behavioral consequences; enhance the identification and monitoring of emerging trends; elucidate individual, social, cultural and contextual factors influencing the initiation of emerging/ current drug using behaviors; examine processes influencing the development and diffusion of new drug trends; identify community- or context specific prevention and health services needs; and provide a scientific foundation for the development of appropriate interventions in response to emerging/current drug abuse trends.

Kay Wanke, Ph.D.
Health Scientists Administrator
(301) 451-8663

Dr. Wanke earned her Ph.D. in clinical psychology from Southern Illinois University at Carbondale and received postdoctoral training in epidemiology and biostatistics, culminating in an M.P.H., from the Harvard School of Public Health. She first came to the National Institutes of Health as a postdoctoral fellow at the National Cancer Institute, where her research explored the behavioral and genetic basis of exposures that lead to cancer, including tobacco use, dietary patterns, and adherence. She has also explored the behavioral and social correlates of substance abuse, mental illness, and health care utilization, as well as the determinants of cognitive impairments among premature infants. In addition, Dr. Wanke has five years of clinical experience that included counseling and assessment in a variety of populations, with a particular emphasis on developmental and psychoeducational evaluations of infants and children. Her program focus in NIDA's Epidemiology Research Branch includes research on nicotine and tobacco, novel phenotypes and endophenotypes, genetic epidemiology, epigenetics, and social neuroscience.

Naimah Weinberg, M.D.
Medical Officer
(301) 402-1908

Dr. Weinberg is a Medical Officer and Director of the Child Psychopathology Vulnerability Program in the Epidemiology Research Branch, Division of Epidemiology, Services, and Prevention Research at the National Institute on Drug Abuse, NIH. She received her training in general psychiatry and child psychiatry at the University of Michigan, and has served on the child psychiatry faculty at the University of Michigan, University of Maryland, and Johns Hopkins University/Kennedy Krieger Institute, and on the editorial board of the Journal of the American Academy of Child and Adolescent Psychiatry. She completed post-doctoral research training in the Department of Mental Hygiene at the Johns Hopkins School of Public Health. Her program focuses on child psychiatric precursors to drug abuse and dependence, with a particular emphasis on attentional and affective disorders, and the impact of mental health interventions on drug abuse risk. Research approaches of particular interest include: epidemiologic (population-based) longitudinal studies; genetic epidemiologic and other studies of familial risk; clinical prospective and follow up studies; and characterizing the interactions between individual psychiatric and genetic factors with the environment.