The Institute has a highly qualified and experienced faculty, representing the fields of health services research, health policy, psychology, social epidemiology, biostatistics, economics, and social demography. Institute faculty are engaged in multiple research studies throughout the College of Medicine, the Health Sciences Center, and the University. The faculty also have multiple collaborations with other universities and federal and state agencies.
Faculty members at the Institute for Child Health Policy maintain joint appointments in the College of Medicine Department of Pediatrics and Department of Epidemiology and Health Policy Research, and affiliate appointments in other departments across the University of Florida. Institute faculty are actively involved in the teaching and mentoring of fellows and graduate students in the Department of Epidemiology and Health Policy Research, the Interdisciplinary Degree Programs offered through the College of Medicine, the College of Liberal Arts and Sciences, and the College of Business.
Please click on the faculty name below to learn more about his or her work:
Jill Boylston Herndon, Ph.D., Research Associate Professor, Department of Epidemiology & Health Policy Research
Dr. Herndon is an economist whose interests include health insurance coverage and access to care, the relationship between health care utilization and expenditure patterns and health outcomes, and health care antitrust. Her current research analyzes the effect of public policy changes on health care coverage and access among low-income children with a focus on Medicaid and the State Children’s Health Insurance Program (SCHIP). Her earlier work has examined the structure and competitiveness of provider and payer markets.
I-Chan Huang, Ph.D., Assistant Professor, Department of Epidemiology & Health Policy Research
Dr. I-Chan Huang is a health services researcher whose areas of specialization include provider profiling, shared-decision making, and health-related quality of life (HRQOL) measurements. He is particularly interested in developing solutions to the problems in assessing patient-reported outcomes. Currently, he is conducting several studies using modern measurement theory to develop HRQOL measurements for children. These analyses use item response theory (IRT) with the goal of increasing efficiency and precision of HRQOL measures in a broad range of children including those with varying socio demographic and health status characteristics. In addition, Dr. Huang is investigating the information needed, especially patient-centered information, by adolescents and their parents to enhance shared-decision making and disease self-management process. Dr. Huang is a member of Editorial Board of the Quality of Life Research.
Caprice Knapp, Ph.D., Assistant Research Scientist, Department of Epidemiology & Health Policy Research
Dr. Knapp received her PhD in economics from the University of Florida in 2003. She is an applied economist whose areas of specialization include examining the quality of care and expenditure patterns for children and adolescents in vulnerable populations. Specifically, Dr. Knapp is investigating the association between sociodemographic factors and health related quality of life for children with life-limiting conditions. In addition to her research agenda, Dr. Knapp is a co-investigator on two statewide projects to evaluate Florida's Title V program for children with special health care needs. Dr. Knapp is a visiting faculty member in the Department of Economics where she teaches Public Finance and Health Economics.
Kelli A. Komro, M.P.H., Ph.D., Associate Professor, Department of Epidemiology & Health Policy Research, and Associate Director, ICHP
Dr. Komro is an epidemiologist specializing in the social and environmental determinants of health among children and adolescents. She has been PI or Co-Investigator on multiple group-randomized controlled trials focusing on preventing alcohol, tobacco and marijuana use; violence; and HIV among youth, both in the U.S. and internationally, including trials in Chicago, rural Minnesota, Russia, India and Tanzania.
Mildred M. Maldonado-Molina, Ph.D., Assistant Professor, Department of Epidemiology & Health Policy Research
Dr. Mildred Maldonado-Molina is a methodologist with interests in longitudinal methods and the prevention of substance use, particularly alcohol use. Her substantive research interests include the study of patterns of substance use among adolescents, prevention of alcohol use among youth, and evaluation of alcohol control policies. Her methodological interests include latent class and latent transition analysis, latent growth modeling, and multi-level models.
June Nogle, Ph.D., Associate Research Scientists, Department of Epidemiology & Health Policy Research
Dr. Nogle is currently evaluating state and federally funded health insurance programs for low-income children. Her particular interest is in service utilization and unmet health care needs for minority and immigrant children.
John Reiss, Ph.D., Associate Professor, Department of Pediatrics
Dr. Reiss, who is a Counseling Psychologist by training, has focused much of his time and effort on facilitating collaborative action among public and private sector organizations at the federal, regional, and state and between families and professionals to improve the organization, financing and delivery of health care for children and youth with special health care needs; and to promote full partnership with families.
Elizabeth A. Shenkman, Ph.D., Professor and Chair, Department of Epidemiology & Health Policy Research, and Director, ICHP
Dr. Shenkman is a health services researcher whose areas of specialization include examining the quality and outcomes of care for children and adolescents in the context of the health care delivery system, their families, and their communities. Dr. Shenkman has a particular focus on assessing the relationship between managed care organizational characteristics, provider practice setting characteristics, and provider reimbursement on the quality and outcomes of care for children and adolescents, including those with special health care needs. In addition, she is an expert in program evaluation, particularly for public insurance programs such as Medicaid and the State Children’s Health Insurance Program and special waiver projects.
Joseph V. Terza, Ph.D., Professor, Department of Epidemiology & Health Policy Research
Dr. Terza’s main areas of research are the development of econometric methods for nonlinear models with endogeneity, the economic causes and consequences of substance abuse, the economics of nicotine and tobacco use, and prescription drug utilization and financing for the elderly.
Alexander C. Wagenaar, Ph.D., Professor, Department of Epidemiology & Health Policy Research
Dr. Wagenaar is a social epidemiologist with expertise in evaluation of public policy changes and community-level interventions, using both randomized trial and time-series research designs and statistical methods.
