Message from the Chair
Milestone Achievements February 2009Message from King Holmes,
William H. Foege Endowed Chair of the Department of Global Health
The Department of Global Health was formally launched in 2007 and is a joint endeavor of the UW School of Medicine and the School of Public Health. The Department was made possible by generous support from the Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation and additional support from the University of Washington and the state of Washington.
Our mission is to close the gap between the world's 1 billion people who experience relatively good health and the 5 billion who experience much lower levels of health through teaching (education, training, and mentoring), research, and service programs. Our goal as a department is to address the causes of, and provide solutions for, disparities in health around the globe. The department is uniquely positioned to take on this challenge. We have more than 200 faculty working in global health across 50 countries. We are not only located in an epicenter of global health but we are an epicenter for global health education.
Since the department's inception, our leaders have looked beyond the six schools of health science (medicine, public health, nursing, social work, pharmacy and dentistry) to expand the scope of global health to all 17 schools and colleges at the University.
"Generation G" and Other UW Global Resources
The UW brings a wealth of interest, expertise, and resources to global health. Young people in the United States and throughout the world today could be called "Generation G" the Global Generation who seek and respond to opportunities to help people and the environment throughout the world. It seems to me that they have become the opposite of the "Me" Generation. It is a privilege and exciting to be in a position to help them explore and fulfill their aspirations.
The Schools of Medicine, Public Health, Nursing, Social Work, Pharmacy, and Dentistry all have programs that address the health needs of underserved populations, both nationally and internationally. Virtually all other schools and colleges of the University also have important programs related to global health. In fact, the UW teaches over 70 languages more than most, if not all, other universities in the nation. Further, the UW ranks first in the nation in number of U. S. Department of Education international area study programs. The NIH Fogarty International Training Center supports nine international research training programs led by UW faculty throughout the world in Africa, Central and South America, and Asia.
Currently, few of these programs are connected to one another. A map of the world with different colored pins representing where each school and college has its international programs would depict a rainbow of colors but very little overlap of different colored pins in any particular city. In general, collaborative international activities seem to have arisen almost randomly based upon the personal contacts of UW faculty or narrowly focused funding opportunities, rather than as the result of coordinated strategic planning. This isn't bad per se, but interdisciplinary collaboration across programs and schools could create economies-of-scale, safer environments for UW students and faculty, and synergistic efforts to solve complex problems.
Key Positions
Judy Wasserheit, MD, MPH, was recruited in November 2006 as the department's first Vice Chair. Judy had previously served as Director of the Division of STD Research Branch at NIH and then as Director of the Center for Disease Control's Division of HIV/STD Prevention, before coming to Seattle to direct the National Institute of Allergy and Infectious Diseases-supported HIV Vaccine Trials Network based at the Fred Hutchinson Cancer Research Center.
In February 2007, Steve Gloyd, MD, MPH, was named Associate Chair for Global Health Education and Curriculum.
Curriculum Plans
While the Department's curriculum will be based in the Schools of Medicine and Public Health, it will benefit from and contribute to the breadth and depth of interdisciplinary programs campus-wide. The Department has formed a Curriculum Advisory Committee, with faculty representatives named by deans of each of the UW's schools and colleges and student representatives from the health sciences and upper campus. This committee will help define core competencies and learning objectives for global health, addressing potential needs and opportunities for a variety of global health certificate, undergraduate, and graduate degree programs, collating existing global health-related courses and learning opportunities offered by the UW, and advising on strategies for curriculum, coordination, and development.
Departmental Locations
The greatest need for the Department of Global Health is a physical location for faculty, staff, and students to work and interact. We envision a future presence in major locations on the UW campus (at sites accessible to the health sciences and to the upper campus), at Harborview Medical Center, and eventually at the planned South Lake Union campus. In early 2009, two floors of the new Ninth and Jefferson Building at Harborview Medical Center 50,000 sq ft will become available to the department. Creating space for Global Health on the UW campus remains a key developmental goal. Having multiple locations introduces both challenges and opportunities: challenges at times in getting everyone together, but opportunities in spreading our work and serving faculty and students broadly across the UW and affiliated institutions.
Working with Our Community Partners
We continue to work with our key community partners other academic institutions, the Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation, Fred Hutchinson Cancer Research Center, Children's Hospital and Regional Medical Center, PATH, the Seattle Biomedical Research Institute, the Infectious Diseases Research Institute, Washington Biotechnology and Biomedical Association, and others to foster local collaborations. We are also a founding member of the Washington Global Health Alliance, a regional alliance formed to harness and maximize the collective global health efforts in the Washington State.
Future Activities
Having completed an initial assessment of global health-related opportunities across the UW campus, we are planning a strategic planning retreat in spring 2009, and have begun adding rapidly to the departmental faculty and staff.
Our work has just begun, and there is an extraordinary amount to do. It is an exciting time for us to draw together and take advantage of our diverse talents and collaborative setting. Collaboration in the interest of improving the health of those most in need worldwide is the name of the game.
I look forward to keeping you informed of our progress as we move forward in building the UW Department of Global Health. If you have any questions, please don't hesitate to contact me at kkh@u.washington.edu or Judy at jwasserh@u.washington.edu.
— Updated October 2008
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