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May 12, 2016

People of the Times

Elaina Vitale has joined the Health Sciences Library System as the National Network of Libraries of Medicine Middle Atlantic Region’s academic coordinator.

Vitale will work to increase awareness of National Library of Medicine information resources and train academic institutions’ librarians, faculty and staff in their use. Her emphasis will be on community colleges and colleges/universities with programs in the health sciences, health and science education, library science, emergency management and environmental health.

She also will assist in coordinating the Middle Atlantic Region’s educational programs.

Richard K. Zimmerman, a faculty member in the School of Medicine’s Department of Family Medicine and the Graduate School of Public Health, is the recipient of the 2016 Curtis G. Hames Research Award.

Among the highest awards in family medicine, the Hames award honors individuals whose careers exemplify dedication to research in family medicine. The award is presented each year at the Society of Teachers of Family Medicine (STFM) spring conference.

The recipient is selected by a committee representing STFM, the American Academy of Family Physicians and the North American Primary Care Research Group.

Zimmerman, who has a joint appointment in the Department of Behavioral and Community Health Sciences in the Graduate School of Public Health, has been a Pitt faculty member since 1991.

He has dedicated his clinical career and much of his research to improving the health of the disadvantaged. His clinical practice is based at the East Liberty Family Health Care Center, which provides care for the underserved. There, he has served on the quality assurance committee and as the health center’s immunization champion.

Zimmerman has over 200 publications on vaccines and vaccine-preventable diseases and has led federally funded research projects on racial disparity and adult immunization and on ways to increase influenza vaccination rates. He is principal investigator for the Pittsburgh site for the U.S. Influenza Vaccine Effectiveness Network. He has won national awards for his research on economic barriers to immunization and for his curricular materials on immunization.

—Compiled by K. Barlow

 


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