Native Investigators

Lisa Scarton, PhD, RN

Dr. Scarton is an Assistant Professor in the Department of Family, Community and Health Systems Science at the University of Florida College of Nursing. Her research focuses on improving diabetes-related health outcomes for families with type 2 diabetes (T2D) in ethnically diverse populations with a focus on the American Indian population. She is also extending her research to those with T2D and cancer, an understudied area.

Learn more about Dr. Scarton >

 

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Sarah Stotz, PhD, MS, RD, CDE

Dr. Stotz is a Senior Instructor at the Colorado School of Public Health at the University of Colorado Anschutz Medical Campus. She is a registered dietitian and certified diabetes educator, and her research focuses on employing qualitative inquiry to understand and address food insecurity as it impacts chronic disease management.

Learn more about Dr. Stotz >

Jordan Lewis, PhD (Aleut from the Native Village of Naknek) 

jplewis@alaska.edu

Dr. Lewis is an Associate Professor with the WWAMI School of Medical Education and Director of the National Resource Center for Alaska Native Elders. His research identifies characteristics that enable Alaska Native elders to age well with a focus on the role of generativity. Using the lessons and experiences of elders, he develops culturally tailored programs and services to improve the health of all generations.

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Naomi Lee, PhD (Seneca Nation)

naomi.ee@nau.edu​

Dr. Lee is an Assistant Professor in the Department of Chemistry and Biochemistry at Northern Arizona University. Her research focuses on using peptide and protein-based vaccines as platforms to target infectious and chronic diseases.

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Ashley Comiford, DrPH (Cherokee)

ashley-comiford@cherokee.org​

Dr. Comiford is the epidemiologist for the Cherokee Nation Community Health Promotion Programs. She serves as the Cherokee Nation Youth Risk Behavior Survey coordinator, data analyst for the Cherokee Nation Adult Tobacco Survey, and lead evaluator for the Cherokee Nation Breast and Cervical Cancer Early Detection Program. Her research interests include Native American public health research, specifically tobacco use and prevention and related chronic diseases.

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Tennille Marley, PhD (White Mountain Apache)

tennille.marley@asu.edu​

Dr. Marley is an Assistant Professor of American Indian Studies at Arizona State University. Her research includes examining structural determinants, particularly housing, and obesity in American Indian adolescents and examining American Indian reservations as segregated places.

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Melissa Tehee, PhD, JD (Cherokee)

melissa.tehee@usu.edu

Dr. Tehee is an Assistant Professor at Utah State University in the Department of Psychology and Director of the American Indian Support Project (AISP). Her research has focused on bias/prejudice/racism, health disparities, and domestic violence and other trauma experienced by ethnic and racial minorities, especially American Indians.

 

Clint Carroll, PhD (Cherokee)

clint.carroll@colorado.edu

Dr. Carroll is an Assistant Professor of Ethnic Studies at the University of Colorado Boulder. He holds a PhD in Environmental Science, Policy, and Management from the University of California-Berkeley and a BA in Anthropology from the University of Arizona. A citizen of the Cherokee Nation, he works with Oklahoma Cherokee government officials and elders on issues of environmental health, governance, and knowledge revitalization.

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Emily Nicklett, PhD (Cherokee)

enicklet@umich.edu​

Dr. Nicklett is an Associate Professor of Social Work at the University of Michigan. Her active research agenda concerns social and contextual determinants of health in later life. She specializes in strategies for successful chronic disease management among diverse older populations.

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Jason Deen, MD (Blackfeet)

Dr. Deen is a board-certified pediatric cardiologist at the Cardiology Clinic at University of Washington Medical Center, an Assistant Professor of Pediatrics, and an Adjunct Assistant Professor of Medicine.

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Vanessa Hiratsuka, PhD (Navajo/Winnemem Wintu)

vhiratsuka@SouthcentralFoundation.com

Dr. Hiratsuka is a Senior Researcher in the Research Department at Southcentral Foundation in Anchorage, Alaska. Her research focus is community-based participatory research within an Alaska Native managed, patient-centered medical home primary care center in urban, rural and frontier communities to reduce health disparities and promote health and wellness in a culturally appropriate manner.

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Zaneta Thayer, PhD (Lakota)

zaneta.marie.thayer@dartmouth.edu

Dr. Thayer is an Assistant Professor in the Department of Anthropology at Dartmouth College. Her research is interested in understanding how (biological mechanisms) and why (evolutionary origins) environmental experiences shape patterns of human biology and health.

 

Deborah Bassett, PhD 

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Valarie Blue Bird Jernigan, DrPH (Choctaw)

valarie-jernigan@ouhsc.edu

Dr. Jernigan is an Associate Professor of Health Promotion Sciences at the College of Public Health, University of Oklahoma Health Sciences Center. She is also Assistant Dean of Research for the School of Community Medicine at the University of Oklahoma. She is a community-based participatory researcher, trained in intervention science, with the goal of combining research and action for social change.

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Kimberly Huyser, PhD (Diné – Navajo Nation)

khuyser@unm.edu​

Dr. Huyser is an Assistant Professor of Sociology at the University of New Mexico. She received her Ph.D. in Sociology in 2010 from the University of Texas at Austin with an Indigenous Studies Graduate Portfolio and a traineeship from the Population Research Center at UT, Austin. Her scholarship combines medical sociology and the sociology of race and ethnicity.

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Raymond Orr, PhD (Potawatomi)

raymond_orr@ou.edu

Dr. Orr is an Associate Professor of Native American Studies at the University of Oklahoma College of Arts and Sciences. His research centers on two approaches to indigenous politics: examining institutions and attitudes internal to Indigenous polities, and seeking to understand attitudes about Indigenous peoples from the perspective of settler societies.

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Vanessa Simonds, ScD (Crow/Blackfeet Tribe)

vanessa.simonds@montana.edu

Dr. Simonds is an Assistant Professor in Community Health at Montana State University. Dr. Simonds uses community-based participatory research approaches to address health and health literacy issues ranging from chronic disease to environmental health among Native Americans.

Kelly Gonzales, PhD (Cherokee)

kelly.gonzales@pdx.edu

Dr. Gonzales is an Assistant Professor of Community Health at Portland State University. Her research is influenced by community-based participatory research principles, and all of her work is guided by strong, active partnerships with American Indian and Alaska Native communities and organizations that serve AI/AN peoples.

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Emily Haozous, PhD, RN (Apache)

EHaozous@PIRE.org

Dr. Haozous is a Research Scientist at the Pacific Institute for Research and Evaluation in Albuquerque, New Mexico. Her research focus is on cancer disparities in American Indians and Alaska Natives.

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Michelle Jacob, PhD (Yakama Nation)

mjacob@uoregon.edu​

Dr. Jacob is a Professor of Indigenous Studies and Director of the Sapsik’ʷałá (Teacher) Education Program in the Department of Education Studies at the University of Oregon. She seeks to understand how indigenous peoples can be empowered to heal from wounds inflicted by colonialism.

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Gayle Morse, PhD (Mohawk)

morseg@sage.edu​

Dr. Morse is a Professor and Graduate Program Director in the Department of Counseling & Community Psychology at Russell Sage College. Her research is interested in ethics, social justice, women’s issues, student learning, and the effects of environmental toxins on health.

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Nichea Spillane, PhD

nspillane@uri.edu

Dr. Spillane is an Assistant Professor in the Psychology Department at the University of Rhode Island. Her research focuses broadly on substance use with a major focus on underserved populations and health disparities. Her work has focused on Indigenous populations in North America, including American Indians in the United States and First Nations in Canada.

Tiffany Beckman, MD (Leech Lake Band of Ojibwe/Minnesota Chippewa Tribe)

Dr. Beckman is an Assistant Professor of Medicine in the Division of Diabetes, Endocrinology and Metabolism at the University of Minnesota. Her primary clinical and research interests are the neurobiology of obesity and diabetes prevention in high-risk populations.

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Annjeanette Belcourt-Dittloff, PhD (Blackfeet, Chippewa, Mandan & Hidatsa)

Dr. Belcourt-Dittloff is a clinical psychologist and Assistant Professor of Pharmacy Practice/ Community and Public Health Sciences at the University of Montana’s College of Health Professions and Biomedical Sciences. Her research interests include resiliency, public health interventions, risk, trauma, mental health disparities and environmental health and public health interventions within the cultural context of American Indian communities.

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Stacey Jolly, MD (Aleut; Bristol Bay Native Corporation)

jollys@ccf.org

Dr. Jolly is an Associate Professor of Medicine at Cleveland Clinic Lerner College of Medicine of CWRU, an Associate Program Director, and a Staff Physician in the Department of General Internal Medicine at the Cleveland Clinic in Cleveland, Ohio. Her research focus is on chronic kidney disease.

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David Perdue, MD, MSPH (Chickasaw Nation of Oklahoma)

Dr. Perdue is Chief Medical Officer at MNGI Digestive Health, a physician practice that specializes in the diagnosis and treatment of adult and pediatric digestive system disorders in Minnesota. Dr. Perdue has a special interest in cancer disparities in American Indian and Alaska Native populations.

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Ka'imi Sinclair, MD (Cherokee)

kaimi.sinclair@wsu.edu

Dr. Sinclair is an Assistant Professor in the Institute for Research and Education to Advance Community Health at Washington State University. For two decades, she has focused on improving diabetes outcomes among health disparity populations. Her work has generally been translational in nature, blending the rigor of randomized controlled trials with a community-based approach.

Angela Gonzales, PhD (Hopi)

angela.a.gonzales@asu.edu​

Dr. Gonzales is an Associate Professor of Women and Gender Studies and Justice and Social Inquiry in the School of Social Transformation at Arizona State University. Her research crosscuts and integrates the fields of Development Sociology and American Indian Studies with empirically driven community-based research that offers a distinctive and essential perspective for understanding sociological processes underlying identity, development, and community health.

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Lonnie Nelson, PhD (Eastern Band Cherokee)

lonnie.nelson@wsu.edu

Dr. Nelson is an Assistant Professor at Washington State University College of Nursing. Within the WSU Initiative for Research and Education to Advance Community Health (IREACH), he works with his colleagues at Partnerships for Native Health to address health disparities experienced by AI/AN communities through the application of culturally adapted, evidence-based interventions and other patient-centered approaches to changing health behaviors.

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Steve Verney, PhD (Tsimshian)

sverney@unm.edu

Dr. Verney is an Associate Professor in the department of Psychology at the University of New Mexico. His research focuses on cultural factors in cognitive aging and mental health disparities in the American Indian/Alaska Native populations.

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Ron Whitener, JD (Squaxin Island Tribe)

ronw@whitenergroup.biz

Ron Whitener is a founding member of The Whitener Group, a team of professionals dedicated to the advancement and sustainability of Indian Tribes, located in Olympia, WA. Her serves at the Director of Tribal Law & Justice Consulting, where he assists tribes, Native American organizations and businesses with the development of their economic development initiatives, tribal court development including cutting-edge systems implementing traditional values, and research program development.

Alison Ball, PhD (Colville Tribe)

Dr. Ball is the Director of Health and Human Services for the Confederated Tribes of the Colville Reservation.

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Denise A. Dillard, PhD (Inupiaq Eskimo)

dadillard@SouthcentralFoundation.com

Dr. Dillard is Director of the Research Department at Southcentral Foundation in Anchorage, Alaska, where she also serves on the Board of Directors as they review and consider approval of research involving Alaska Native people in and around Anchorage. She has conducted postdoctoral quantitative and qualitative research since 1998 and is a licensed psychologist.

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Patrik Johansson, MD, MPH

pjohansson@unmc.edu

Dr. Johansson is an Associate Professor in the Department of Health Promotion and Director of the Rural Health Education Network at the University of Nebraska Medical Center. His research interests include health disparities, perceived discrimination, and rural health professions.

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Kelly Moore, MD (Muscogee Creek)

Kelly.Moore@cuanschutz.edu

Dr. Moore is an Associate Professor with the Centers for American Indian and Alaska Native Health of the Colorado School of Public Health on the University of Colorado Anschutz Medical Campus. She is a retired Captain in the United States Public Health Service Commissioned Corps, with 20 years of service to the Indian Health Service.

Lori Arviso-Alvord, MD (Diné)

Dr. Alvord is a Board Certified Surgeon at Astria Health in Toppenish, WA. She has over 30 years of surgical experience and was the first Navajo woman to become a general surgeon.

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Margaret Moss, PhD, JD, RN (Mandan, Hidatsa, and Arikara Nation)

margaret.moss@ubc.ca​​

Dr. Moss is an Associate Professor in the School of Nursing at the University of British Columbia. She is the first and only American Indian to hold both nursing and juris doctorates, and published the first nursing textbook on American Indian health (Springer 2015). Her areas of research include American Indian health, aging, health policy and health disparities with a focus on social and structural determinants of health.

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Nina Wampler, DSc (Eastern Band of Cherokee)

Dr. Wampler is a retired Associate Research Scientist from the Native American Research and Training Center at the University of Arizona. The main focus of Dr. Wampler’s research career has been community based participatory research on the epidemiology of chronic diseases among Native Americans, including women’s health, cancer, and tobacco control.

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Mark Daniels, PhD

Dr. Daniels is an integrated health therapist at Sanford Vermillion Health Center in South Dakota. He specializes in clinical psychology, trauma, health psychology, and Native American mental health.

Eva Garroutte, PhD (Cherokee)

Dr. Garroutte is a Research Associate Professor in the Department of Sociology at Boston College. Her research interests are related to the study of Native American issues, racial/ethnic identity, religion, and health disparities associated with aging and culture.

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R. Turner Goins, PhD

rtgoins@email.wcu.edu​

Dr. Goins is a Professor of Gerontological Social Work at Western Carolina University in Cullowhee, NC. Her research has focused on American Indian and Alaska Native health- and aging-related issues, with her primary data collection efforts with tribal communities adopting a community-based participatory research approach, wherein her research examines issues of local importance.

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Patricia Nez Henderson, MD, MPH (Diné)

pnhenderson@bhcaih.org​​

Dr. Nez Henderson is Vice President for the Black Hills Center for American Indian Health, an American Indian nonprofit health organization located in Rapid City, SD. Dr. Nez Henderson is the first Navajo woman to graduate from the Yale University School of Medicine, and she is acknowledged as one of the leading authorities on tobacco control in American Indian communities.

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Alfred Bryant, Jr., PhD (Lumbee)

alfred.bryant@uncp.edu

Dr. Bryant is a Professor in the Department of Counseling at the University of North Carolina Pembroke, and he is also the Founding Director of the Southeast American Indian Studies (SAIS) Program. His research and scholarship focuses on racial identity development, multicultural counseling and cultural differences in parental emotional communication.

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Britt Conroy, MD, PhD

Dr. Conroy is a board certified physician at the UH Cleveland Medical Center. She specializes in family medicine and general preventive medicine.

Jeff Henderson, MD (Lakota, Cheyenne River Sioux)

jhenderson@bhcaih.org​

Dr. Henderson is founder, President, and CEO of the Black Hills Center for American Indian Health, a community-based, non-profit, research-intensive organization whose mission is to enhance the health and wellness of American Indians through research, service, education and philanthropy.

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Dorothy Rhoades, MD, MPH (Kiowa Tribe of Oklahoma)

dorothy-rhoades@ouhsc.edu​​

Dr. Rhoades is Director of the American Indian Cancer Research Initiatives at the Stephenson Cancer Center of the University of Oklahoma. She is also a Clinical Associate Professor in the Department of Medicine. Her past research has focused on expanding partnerships with AI/AN communities, equipping AI/AN investigators for successful research careers, and promoting a program of research that holds promise for reducing the disparities in health status and care within these special populations.

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Yvette Roubideaux, MD (Rosebud Sioux/Standing Rock Sioux)

yroubideaux@NCAI.org

Dr. Roubideaux is the Director of the Policy Research Center at the National Congress of American Indians, located at the Embassy of Tribal Nations in Washington, DC. Her career has focused on teaching, research, and program development related to diabetes in American Indians and Alaska Natives and Indian health policy. She has been active for years at the federal level in efforts to increase resources, research, and the quality of services to tribal communities.