Leadership

• Eugene Orringer, MD: Co-Director. In addition to his own clinical and research activities in sickle cell disease, Dr. Orringer’s true passion has long been the training of young clinical investigators. He is director of the UNC-CH MD-PhD Program, the PI of the Medical Scientist Training Program grant and was the PI on three K12 grants. He is a participant in numerous NIH-funded postdoctoral training programs and has been actively involved in developing new training opportunities and establishing career paths for trainees and junior faculty members in all aspects of clinical and translational research. Dr. Orringer is well supported by the NIH and has written over 100 papers.

• Morris Weinberger, PhD: Co-Director. Dr. Weinberger is the Vergil N. Slee Distinguished Professor of Healthcare Quality Management in the Department of Health Policy and Management at the Gillings School of Global Public Health.  Dr. Weinberger’s research is multidisciplinary. He is a health services researcher who uses randomized trials to develop, implement, and evaluate novel interventions. He has conducted ground-breaking research in telephone-based interventions, disease management, and primary care-based strategies to reduce hospital utilization. Dr. Weinberger is particularly interested in translating effective interventions into practice settings in order to improve both the process and outcomes of care. He has over 170 peer-reviewed publications.

• William Miller, MD, PhD, MPH: Curriculum Director. Dr. Miller has directed the K30 curriculum for the past four years and has served as a core faculty member for the K30 program, the Roadmap K12 program, the General Medicine Faculty Fellows program, and the RWJ Clinical Scholars Program. He has taught Clinical Measurement and Evaluation (our clinical research methods course) for 11 years and has chaired the doctoral committees of 17 epidemiology graduate students. He is an NIH-supported independent investigator with over 100 publications.

• David Ransohoff, MD: Translational Research Curriculum Program Director (formerly K30). Dr. Ransohoff will be responsible for the supervision of faculty activities in planning both the didactic coursework and increasing research experience for our trainees. Patricia Byrns, MD, Translational Research Curriculum Program Associate Director, has primary responsibility for working on a one-on-one basis with the individual scholars and their mentors as they develop grant proposals and research projects.

• Susan Pusek, MPH, MS: Director, Education Programs. Ms. Pusek will work closely with Drs. Orringer, Weinberger, and Miller to manage all educational activities within the ETCD Core. She will serve as the liaison between this Core and the trainees themselves, as well as community members who wish to access Core training resources. For the past six years, Ms. Pusek has been the director of Training and Career Development for the General Clinical Research Center (GCRC), where she recruited numerous trainee investigators, helping them to understand and take advantage of the various GCRC resources, and assisted trainees in all aspects of their research, including protocol development, implementation and regulatory compliance. She also has served as the co-director of the Doris Duke Clinical Research Fellowship Program. Ms. Pusek regularly lectures in a number of existing campus courses, primarily focusing on research ethics and regulatory compliance in clinical trials. She has 17 years of direct experience in the conduct of clinical research across all phases and disciplines.

• Interdisciplinary Advisory Committee. This committee will serve as a study section that will interview and select scholars for the K30 and KL2 Programs. Members of this committee represent a wide variety of departments and centers at UNC-CH. Each Health Affairs School is represented with a demonstrated interest in the career development of junior investigators. Each member of the committee occupies a leadership role in interdisciplinary research, and all are well-respected and well-funded investigators.