Associate Professor, Epidemiology
About
I started here at the University of Michigan in the fall of 2019 after having spent 11 years on the faculty at the University of New Mexico College of Population Health.
My research interests include environmental and occupational epidemiology, reproductive epidemiology, and child health and development examined within social, political, and economic contexts and in global settings. My research focuses on populations who are traditionally underrepresented in research, including Latinx and Indigenous populations in the U.S. and Latin America and those who are most exposed to hazardous work conditions and environmental toxins such as farm-workers, with a particular focus on women and their children.
I have spent much of my career focused on my work in Ecuador assessing the impact of the flower industry and its related exposures (chemical, psychosocial, structural) among Ecuadorian female flower workers and on child health and development as well as the impact of this industry on surrounding communities.
I am also the Principal Investigator of the Michigan Farmworker Project, which examines the occupational and environmental health exposures in migrant and seasonal farmworkers in Michigan and relates this understanding to broader social determinants such as labor exploitation and forced labor, and the impact of these exposures on the health of farmworkers and their families - most of whom come from Mexico.
