News from Those Nerdy Girls

We are an all-female team of PhD researchers and clinicians whose mission is to educate and empower individuals to successfully navigate science and health information.

Aparna Kumar is an Associate Clinical Professor and Psychiatric Mental Health Nurse Practitioner (PMHNP) at Emory University/The Carter Center. She loves to break down stigma around mental health and serve up truth with a side of laughs.

Jenn Dowd is Professor of Demography & Population Health & Deputy Director of the Leverhulme Centre for Demographic Science, University of Oxford.

MK is a nurse practitioner, a lactation consultant, & founder of Charm City Wellness Collaborative in Baltimore, MD. Interests are reproductive health, care of LGBTQ+ families, & health equity for people marginalized due to intersecting identities.

Trained as a physician and an educator, Dr. Hall is passionate about interpreting science and communicating it to people in ways that can help them understand their bodies and make good health decisions.

Scientist (PhD genetics) with a passion for using science to make healthy choices. Lover of nature and fitness. Mom of three kids in Vancouver, Canada.

I'm a public health and behavioral science expert with experience writing about misinformation and science denial.

Dr. Simanek is Associate Professor in the Chicago Medical School and Director of the Center for Health Equity Research at Rosalind Franklin University. She studies how social inequities in health develop across the lifecourse and over generations.

Elisabeth holds a PhD in genetics and immunology. She recently left her university faculty position to focus on science education and outreach to the public. She is also a wife, mother, hiker, runner and avid reader.

GenX diary-inspired stories and long-form interviews. Elsewhere, I'm an oncology pharmacist, medical writer and reviewer.

Dr. Sarah Coles is a family physician and program director for the Family and Community Medicine Residency at North Country HealthCare and associate professor at the University of Arizona College of Medicine – Phoenix.

Dr. Malia Jones is an Assistant Professor at UW-Madison. Her research focuses on vaccine hesitancy and herd immunity. She's also the accidental co-founder and Director of Research at Those Nerdy Girls.

Katherine Cartwright is an Obstetrician and Gynecologist. She has an interest in the integration of evidence-based medicine and patient education, both individually in the exam room and on a broader community health level.

Philly Nerdy Girl, Behavioral Scientist, LEGO Serious Play obsessed.

Family and geriatric medicine physician, osteopathic enthusiast, mom to 2 boys. My philosophy for patient care is 1) evidence based medicine first, then 2) common sense when evidence isn’t available. I am a lifelong believer in causing good trouble.

Andrea Harmony is a Nurse Practitioner in Pediatric Urgent Care and a Public Health Professional.

Roopa Seshadri is a quantitative social scientist who studies the impact of human services programs on health and wellbeing outcomes in at-risk and underserved populations.

Brianna is a Geriatric and Palliative Care Nurse Practitioner and researcher with over a decade of nursing experience caring for older adults living with serious illnesses including dementia, cancer, and severe brain injury.

Aging Squad Lead at Those Nerdy Girls. Director of Research at NewCourtland, a housing, health, and service coordination provider in Philadelphia, PA. She integrates clinical knowledge, health policy, and research to translate science to daily life.

Christina Whitehouse is an Assistant Professor at Villanova University Fitzpatrick College of Nursing, Villanova, PA. She is an adult health/gerontology primary care nurse practitioner and certified diabetes care & education specialist.

Clara is a registered nurse interested in exploring the care and wellbeing of older adults. more

Sandy Laping is a Physical Therapist, who is now shifting her career into the public health domain. She is studying for a Masters of Epidemiology at the London School of Hygiene and Tropical Medicine.

Megan Reilly is an MD/MPH candidate at the University of Wisconsin School of Medicine and Public Health. She is interested in battling misinformation, healthcare access, community outreach, reproductive health, and health literacy.

Lauren Hale, PhD (Stony Brook University) studies the social patterning of sleep health. Dr. Hale is the Immediate Past Chair of the National Sleep Foundation and founding Editor-in-Chief of Sleep Health.

Dr. Sandra Albrecht is a bilingual social and nutritional epidemiologist who studies the barriers that prevent people from eating in a healthy way and that make it difficult to prevent and manage nutrition-related diseases like diabetes.

Psychiatric Epidemiologist at The Ohio State University, also interested in maternal child health.

PhD Scientist in Molecular and Cellular Oncology, Science Communicator, and Author who focuses on gut health and the gut microbiome.

Dr. Kountourides completed her PhD in Repro Health at the University of Oxford. In her professional capacity, she works at Ofcom as a statistician, focusing on illegal harms in the online sphere. She loves to talk about science and her pet rabbits. more

MacKenzie (Kenzie) is a health educator currently studying at the University of Oxford. She is passionate about positive youth development and culturally sustaining health communication and promotion.

Ilana Gerjuoy, MPH, works on health policy and communications for a community coalition in Western Massachusetts.

Public health professional and research guru located in Madison, WI. UW-Madison MPH and UCLA alum with experience in Alzheimer's, Schizophrenia, global health, women's health, and bioinformatics research.