Scott Barnhart

Professor Scott Barnhart is stepping down after eight years as associate dean of the School of Medicine and medical director at Harborview Medical Center. He has a joint appointment in the departments of Medicine and Environmental and Occupational Health Sciences. He will continue his faculty appointment in our department.

Erica Finsness

Graduate student Erica Finsness spent a month in Cambodia working with a nongovernmental organization, RDI Cambodia, that focuses on water and sanitation improvements, and other aspects of health promotion. Her diary is linked from our department's website.

Lecturer Rick Gleason made a presentation on occupational health hazards in winemaking to the West Coast Constellation Winery Association's annual meeting in Napa, California, in January. He also spoke to the Seattle Vicinity Construction Safety Council in February on "Construction safety statistics in Washington: How does it compare to other states?" and the Teamsters Training Consortium annual conference in Ontario, California, in March on effective training techniques for adult learners.

Janessa Graves

Graduate student Janessa Graves received a grant, awarded collaboratively by the American Public Health Association and Colgate-Palmolive, to do work in Kenya for 18 months. She will evaluate a hand-washing promotion campaign, and will also try to help community residents develop a soap-making business, to facilitate sustainability of hand washing and other sanitation efforts there.

Communication director Kathy Hall and graphic designer Cathy Schwartz won Best of Show in the publications division of the Society for Technical Communication Puget Sound 2007–2008 competition. Their publication, the department's 2007 calendar, describes the range of the department's research, teaching, and service activities. They, along with Collen Marquist, also won an STC Excellence Award for The Clearest Skies: A History of Seattle's Air Pollution Control Efforts, the concluding publication of the EPA/Northwest Research Center for Particulate Air Pollution and Health.

Associate Professor Matt Keifer was a reviewer for the Healthier Wisconsin Project. He also conducted a pesticide health effects training course for rural clinicians in San Juan, Puerto Rico.

Research Associate Professor L.-J. Sally Liu received a grant from the European Union as part of its Framework Programme 7 to study European-wide long-term air pollution effects. She will be leading the central European Exposure Assessment Center at the University of Basel, covering Switzerland, Austria, Northern Italy, and Southern Germany.

Alex Lu, a former research scientist in our department, was featured on the front page of the Jan. 30 issue of the Seattle Post-Intelligencer for his study of children and organic food.

The Pacific Northwest Agricultural Safety and Health Center (PNASH) continues its annual sponsorship of Ag Safety Day, the bilingual Washington Governor's Safety and Health Conference for the agricultural industry. Professor Richard Fenske and Outreach Director Helen Murphy served on the advisory board. PNASH organized a health fair at the Yakima event, including heat stress and pesticide exposure games, fluorescent tracer demonstrations, hearing tests, and health screenings. Keifer and Epidemiology graduate student Jon Hofmann presented preliminary results from their study of risk factors for pesticide exposure among pesticide handlers.

Sheela Sathyanarayana and Catherine Karr of our Pediatric Environmental Health Specialty Unit (PEHSU), received wide media coverage of their study of phthalates found in some baby products such as shampoos and lotions. They found that babies exposed to lotion, shampoo, and powder had more than four times the level of phthalates in their urine as those whose parents had not used these products. Phthalates have been linked to damage of the male reproductive system.

Murphy, Marcy Harrington, and Karr were active in this year's Western Migrant Stream Forum in Spokane. The forum is an educational conference for farmworker community health care providers and people engaged in Hispanic health research. Murphy, outreach director for PNASH, is also teaching eight pesticide recertification classes throughout the state, focusing on the acute and long-term effects of pesticide exposure and on study design issues.

Amy Sly

Amy Sly, a 2006 MS graduate, has just been certified as a Marine Chemist. She is the first woman to achieve this certification. Certified marine chemists help prevent onboard health hazards, along with fires and explosions in accordance with Coast Guard and OSHA regulations.

Erin Corwine and Jeff Shirai were nominated for the UW's Distinguished Staff Awards for 2008. Corwine coordinates the school bus research program in Sally Liu's lab. Shirai manages John Kissel's lab.

Lecturer Kate Stewart has been awarded a Fulbright grant to teach and work in ergonomics projects in Nicaragua from October 2008 through March 2009. She will be teaching at the Universidad Autonoma de Nicaragua and will be working on a project to redesign the harnesses and bags used by coffee harvesters. She will help several students with their research in a garment factory. She is working with Dr. Aurora Aragon, director of the Centro de Investigacion en Slaud Trabaho y Ambiente (The Center for Research in Occupational and Environmental Health) to start a center for ergonomics in Central America.

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