National Academies Press: OpenBook

Veterans and Agent Orange: Update 2004 (2005)

Chapter: Appendix D: Committee and Staff Biographies

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Suggested Citation:"Appendix D: Committee and Staff Biographies." Institute of Medicine. 2005. Veterans and Agent Orange: Update 2004. Washington, DC: The National Academies Press. doi: 10.17226/11242.
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APPENDIX D
Committee to Review the Health Effects in Vietnam Veterans of Exposure to Herbicides (Fourth Biennial Update)

John J. Stegeman, Ph.D. (Chair), is Senior Scientist and Chair of the Biology Department at the Woods Hole Oceanographic Institution in Woods Hole, Massachusetts. He received his doctorate in biochemistry, with a concentration in enzymology, from Northwestern University. His research involves the metabolism of foreign chemicals by animals and humans and the structure, function, and regulation of the enzymes that accomplish that metabolism. Dr. Stegeman served on the Veterans and Agent Orange: Update 2000 and the Veterans and Agent Orange: Update 2002 committees.


Kiros T. Berhane, Ph.D., is Associate Professor in the Department of Preventive Medicine at the University of Southern California, Los Angeles. His research has considered longitudinal-time series analysis, flexible-modeling techniques, modeling time-to-event data, and latency. Dr. Berhane received his doctorate in biostatistics from the University of Toronto (Canada) and completed a postdoctoral fellowship in biostatistics at Johns Hopkins University (1994–1995). He currently serves as a member on a scientific advisory panel for an air pollution study under the auspices of the Western Interprovincial Scientific Studies Association in Canada. Dr. Berhane served on the Veterans and Agent Orange: Update 2002 committee.


Paul F. Engstrom, M.D., is Senior Vice President of the Population Science Division and Medical Director of the Fox Chase Network at the Fox Chase Cancer Center. Dr. Engstrom’s research interests include chemoprevention. He served on the Veterans and Agent Orange: Update 2002 committee.

Suggested Citation:"Appendix D: Committee and Staff Biographies." Institute of Medicine. 2005. Veterans and Agent Orange: Update 2004. Washington, DC: The National Academies Press. doi: 10.17226/11242.
×

Richard A. Fenske, Ph.D., is Professor of Environmental and Occupational Health Sciences and Director of the Pacific Northwest Agricultural Safety and Health Center at the University of Washington in Seattle. Dr. Fenske’s work has focused on the evaluation of environmental health risks in special populations. His specialty areas include health risks of pesticide exposures, development of new exposure assessment methods, and investigation of the role of skin exposure in workers and children. Dr. Fenske served on the Veterans and Agent Orange: Update 2002 committee.


Jordan Firestone, M.D., Ph.D., M.P.H., is Assistant Professor of Neurology and Director of the Occupational and Environmental Medicine Clinic at the University of Washington in Seattle. Dr. Firestone’s research involves chemical exposures and their interactions with individual genetic susceptibility in neurologic disease, with a special focus on Parkinson’s disease. His clinical specialty is in occupational neurotoxicology.


Thomas A. Gasiewicz, Ph.D., is Professor and Chair of the Department of Environmental Medicine and Director of the Environmental Health Sciences Center in the Department of Environmental Medicine at the University of Rochester, School of Medicine. Dr. Gasiewicz has published extensively on the toxicokinetics of dioxin, dioxin toxicity, and the aryl hydrocarbon receptor in the molecular mechanism of dioxin toxicity. Dr. Gasiewicz served on the Veterans and Agent Orange: Update 2000 and the Veterans and Agent Orange: Update 2002 committees.


Claudia Hopenhayn, Ph.D., M.P.H., is Assistant Professor in the Department of Preventive Medicine at the University of Kentucky School for Public Health. Her primary research focuses on cancer and reproductive outcomes within the context of environmental and occupational epidemiology and cancer control. Dr. Hopenhyn’s expertise combines toxicology, biologic markers of exposure and effect, statistics, risk factors, and assessment of intervention within a framework of epidemiology and multidisciplinary collaborations, both in the United States and abroad.


Nancy I. Kerkvliet, Ph.D., is Professor in the Department of Environmental and Molecular Toxicology at Oregon State University. Dr. Kerkvliet’s research has focused on animal modeling to explain how specific chemicals alter immune function and how immune suppression caused by dioxin is mediated by the aryl hydorcarbon receptor, a transcription factor that is activated upon ligand binding. She previously served on the Subcommittee of Jet Propulsion Fuel 8 and the Committee on Toxicology.

Suggested Citation:"Appendix D: Committee and Staff Biographies." Institute of Medicine. 2005. Veterans and Agent Orange: Update 2004. Washington, DC: The National Academies Press. doi: 10.17226/11242.
×

Loren D. Koller, D.V.M., Ph.D., has served in academia for nearly 30 years, the past 16 as Professor in the College of Veterinary Medicine, Oregon State University, Corvallis. Dr. Koller was dean of the college for 10 years. He was the first chair of the Society of Toxicology’s Immunotoxicology Specialty Section. Dr. Koller serves on the Committee on the Assessment of Wartime Exposure to Herbicides and served on the Veterans and Agent Orange: Update 2000 and the Veterans and Agent Orange: Update 2002 committees.


Joel McCullough, M.D., M.P.H., M.S., is Medical Director of Environmental Health for the Chicago Department of Public Health. Dr. McCullough received his medical degree from the Vanderbilt University School of Medicine, a master’s of science in preventive medicine from the University of Iowa Graduate School of Preventive Medicine, and a master’s of public health from the University of Washington School of Public Health. He has worked for several organizations, including the National Center for Environmental Health and the National Institute for Occupational Safety and Health. Dr. McCullough has been in his current position since October of 2001.


David S. Strogatz, Ph.D., M.S.P.H., is Associate Professor and Chair of the Department of Epidemiology and Biostatistics at the State University of New York School of Public Health in Albany. Dr. Strogatz originally became involved with the Agent Orange studies when he served as a reviewer for the Veterans and Agent Orange: Update 1998 report. He subsequently served as a member of the Veterans and Agent Orange: Update 2000 and the Veterans and Agent Orange: Update 2002 committees. His research examines the epidemiology of diseases including diabetes and cardiovascular disease, and the impact of socioeconomic status and race on health.

Staff Biographies

Michelle Catlin, Ph.D., is Senior Program Officer in the Institute of Medicine (IOM) Board on Health Promotion and Disease Prevention. Before joining IOM, she served as Program Officer with the Board on Environmental Studies and Toxicology of the National Research Council. She received a master’s of science in pharmacology and toxicology from Queen’s University, Canada, and a doctorate in environmental health (toxicology) from the University of Washington. Dr. Catlin has worked on numerous National Academies reports, including Copper in Drinking Water, Toxicological Effects of Methylmercury, Arsenic in Drinking Water: 2001 Update, and Veterans and Agent Orange: Update 2000.


Mary Burr Paxton, Ph.D., is Senior Program Officer in the IOM Board on Health Promotion and Disease Prevention. Before joining IOM, she worked as a consultant on the regulation of toxic substances and managed the conduct and

Suggested Citation:"Appendix D: Committee and Staff Biographies." Institute of Medicine. 2005. Veterans and Agent Orange: Update 2004. Washington, DC: The National Academies Press. doi: 10.17226/11242.
×

analysis of several epidemiology studies on veterans’ health. She received a master’s of science in biostatistics from the Johns Hopkins School of Hygiene and Public Health and a doctorate in genetics from the George Washington University. She is a diplomate of the American Board of Toxicology. Dr. Paxton has worked on several National Academies reports, including Issues in Risk Assessment, Environmental Neurotoxicology, Gulf War and Health: Insecticides and Solvents, and Gulf War and Health: Fuels, Combustion Products, and Propellants.


Jennifer A. Cohen is Senior Program Associate in the IOM Board on Health Promotion and Disease Prevention. She received her undergraduate degree in art history from the University of Maryland. She also has been involved with the IOM committees that produced Organ Procurement and Transplantation, Clearing the Air: Asthma and Indoor Air Exposures; Veterans and Agent Orange: Herbicide/Dioxin Exposure and Type 2 Diabetes; Veterans and Agent Orange: Update 2000, and Veterans and Agent Orange: Herbicide/Dioxin Exposure and Acute Myelogenous Leukemia in the Children of Vietnam Veterans.


Rose Marie Martinez, Sc.D., is Director of the IOM Board on Health Promotion and Disease Prevention. Before joining IOM, she was Senior Health Researcher at Mathematica Policy Research, where she studied the effects of health-system change on the public-health infrastructure, access to care for vulnerable populations, managed care, and the health care workforce. Dr. Martinez is former Assistant Director for Health Financing and Policy with the US General Accounting Office, for which she directed evaluations and policy analysis on national and public-health issues. Dr. Martinez received her doctorate from the Johns Hopkins School of Hygiene and Public Health.


David A. Butler, PhD, is a senior program officer in the IOM Board on Public Health. He received his BS and MS in engineering from the University of Rochester and PhD in public-policy analysis from Carnegie-Mellon University. Before joining IOM, Dr. Butler served as an analyst for the US Congress Office of Technology Assessment and was a research associate in the Department of Environmental Health at the Harvard School of Public Health. He has directed several IOM studies on environmental-health and risk-assessment topics, resulting in the reports Veterans and Agent Orange: Update 1998, and …Update 2000; the report series Characterizing the Exposure of Veterans to Agent Orange and Other Herbicides Used in Vietnam; Clearing the Air: Asthma and Indoor Air Exposures; and Damp Indoor Spaces and Health.


Sonia J. Cheruvillil is a senior program assistant in the IOM Board on Health Promotion and Disease Prevention. She is currently a graduate student at the George Washington University School of Public Health. She received her under-

Suggested Citation:"Appendix D: Committee and Staff Biographies." Institute of Medicine. 2005. Veterans and Agent Orange: Update 2004. Washington, DC: The National Academies Press. doi: 10.17226/11242.
×

graduate degrees in English Literature (BA) and Microbiology (BS) from the University of Iowa. She is involved with the IOM Committee on the Disposition of the Air Force Health Study (AFHS). Veterans and Agent Orange: Update 2002 is Sonia’s first report with IOM.


Joe A. Esparza worked as a project assistant in the IOM Board on Health Promotion and Disease Prevention. He attended Columbia University in the City of New York where he studied biochemistry. Joe was involved with the committees that produced Frontiers in Agricultural Research: Food, Health, Environment, and Communities; Air Emissions from Animal Feeding Operations: Current Knowledge, Future Needs; Publicly Funded Agricultural Research and the Changing Structure of US Agriculture; and Veterans and Agent Orange: Update 2002.


Peter James is a research assistant in the IOM Board on Health Promotion and Disease Prevention. He received his undergraduate degree in environmental science and the history and sociology of science from the University of Pennsylvania. He is a candidate for a Master of Health Science degree at the Johns Hopkins University Bloomberg School of Public Health in the Department of Environmental Health Sciences. In addition to his work with the Veterans and Agent Orange studies, he is involved with the Gulf War and Health studies.

Suggested Citation:"Appendix D: Committee and Staff Biographies." Institute of Medicine. 2005. Veterans and Agent Orange: Update 2004. Washington, DC: The National Academies Press. doi: 10.17226/11242.
×
Page 575
Suggested Citation:"Appendix D: Committee and Staff Biographies." Institute of Medicine. 2005. Veterans and Agent Orange: Update 2004. Washington, DC: The National Academies Press. doi: 10.17226/11242.
×
Page 576
Suggested Citation:"Appendix D: Committee and Staff Biographies." Institute of Medicine. 2005. Veterans and Agent Orange: Update 2004. Washington, DC: The National Academies Press. doi: 10.17226/11242.
×
Page 577
Suggested Citation:"Appendix D: Committee and Staff Biographies." Institute of Medicine. 2005. Veterans and Agent Orange: Update 2004. Washington, DC: The National Academies Press. doi: 10.17226/11242.
×
Page 578
Suggested Citation:"Appendix D: Committee and Staff Biographies." Institute of Medicine. 2005. Veterans and Agent Orange: Update 2004. Washington, DC: The National Academies Press. doi: 10.17226/11242.
×
Page 579
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Veterans and Agent Orange: Update 2004 Get This Book
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Sixth in a series of congressionally mandated studies, this book is an updated review and evaluation of the available evidence regarding the statistical assoication between exposure to herbicides used in Vietnam and various adverse health outcomes suspected to be linked with such exposure.

This book builds upon the information contained in the earlier books in the series:

  • Veterans and Agent Orange: Health Effects of Herbicides Used in Vietnam (1994)
    • Veterans and Agent Orange: Update 1996
    • Veterans and Agent Orange: Update 1998
    • Veterans and Agent Orange: Update 2000
    • Veterans and Agent Orange: Update 2002
    • Veterans and Agent Orange: Herbicides and Dioxin Exposure and Type 2 Diabetes (2000)
    • Veterans and Agent Orange: Herbicide/Dioxin Exposure and Acute Myelogenous Leukemia in the Children of Vietnam Veterans (2002)

      Veterans and Agent Orange: Update 2004 focuses primarily on scientific studies and other information developed since the release of these earlier books. The previous volumes have noted that sufficient evidence exists to link chronic lymphocytic leukemia, soft-tissue sarcoma, non-Hodgkin’s lymphoma, Hodgkin’s disease, and chloracne with exposure. The books also noted that there is “limited or suggestive” evidence of an association between exposure and respiratory cancers, prostate cancer, multiple myeloma, the metabolic disorder porphyria cutanea tarda, early-onset transient peripheral neuropathies, Type 2 diabetes, and the congenital birth defect spinal bifida in veterans’ children. This volume will be critically important to both policymakers and physicians in the federal government, Vietnam veterans and their families, veterans’ organizations, researchers, and health professionals.

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