Cardiovascular Disease

Chair: Biswadeep Dhar, PhD, M.Ed., MS
Dr. Biswadeep Dhar is a prevention scientist in behavioral and social health sciences and an Assistant Professor of Health Sciences at James Madison University. His primary area is public health and health disparities; however, his program of research is also focused on behavioral health finance of chronic diseases. 

He completed his postdoctoral research in health evaluation in the Department of Health Research and Evaluation at the University of Illinois Chicago College of Medicine (Rockford). He received his PhD in Human Development (emphasis in health disparities) from the University of Florida, and he has been an active member of the Society of Behavioral Medicine since then. 

His primary research focuses on chronic disease prevention using mixed methods research, focusing on dietary and financial behavioral interventions among diverse populations in the United States and across the globe. He is serving as an Associate Editor of Translational Behavioral Medicine and has served on various boards at the Society of Behavioral Medicine, and currently represents SBM (USA) at the International Society of Behavioral Medicine (ISBM).

 

Incoming Chair: Hailey Miller, PhD, RN
Dr. Hailey Miller is a registered nurse and Assistant Professor at Johns Hopkins School of Nursing. She is also faculty in the Recruitment Innovation Unit at the Johns Hopkins Institute for Clinical and Translational Research. She has a program of research focused on cardiovascular disease prevention, nutrition interventions, and recruitment methodology. Her current portfolio includes evaluating Food Is Medicine models to improve nutrition access and diet quality, evaluating health system-based strategies to optimize patient identification and referral to nutrition support programs, and testing innovative approaches to enhance cardiovascular clinical trial enrollment and representation among diverse populations.
 

 

Immediate Past-Chair: Caroline Doyle, PhD
Dr. Caroline Doyle is a clinical psychologist and assistant professor in the departments of Psychiatry & Behavioral Sciences as well as Internal Medicine at Rush University Medical Center. She completed her postdoctoral fellowship in the T32 Cardiovascular Behavioral Medicine Research Training Program as well as the Center for Sleep and Circadian Science in the Department of Psychiatry at the University of Pittsburgh. She received her PhD in Clinical Psychology (health emphasis) from the University of Arizona and completed her clinical internship in Behavioral Medicine at the VA Palo Alto Health Care System/Stanford University School of Medicine. Dr. Doyle is interested in understanding how sleep impacts cardiovascular health and the role that the spectrum of stress responses, including PTSD, plays in this relationship. Clinically, she has specialties in treating sleep disorders and trauma and stressor-related disorders in patients with medical or psychiatric comorbidities. 

 

Communications Director: Abbey Collins, PhD
Dr. Collins received her PhD in Applied Social Psychology from North Carolina State University, where she worked with Dr. Vanessa Volpe in the Black Health Lab. Her next step is to complete a postdoctoral research fellowship. Her research focus is assessing how the experience of stress affects cardiovascular health, health behaviors, and physiological reactivity among Black individuals in the United States, specifically taking an intersectional approach, focusing on Black young adult women. One of the core tenets of her research is that to equitably address disease risk, it is critical to identify areas in measurement and treatment that need to be tailored to best fit the considerations of diverse populations.
 

 

Membership Director: Katharine Sears Edwards, PhD
Katie S. Edwards, PhD is a licensed clinical psychologist and Clinical Associate Professor of Medicine in the Division of Cardiovascular Medicine at Stanford University. She received her PhD from the University of Houston and completed her behavioral medicine internship and fellowship at the Palo Alto VA Medical Center.  She is a cognitive behavioral therapist trained in mindfulness-based interventions (e.g. ACT, MBSR) and board certified in biofeedback. Dr. Edwards started the Cardiac Behavioral Medicine service at Stanford, which provides evidence-based behavioral treatments to promote adjustment, recovery, medical adherence, and secondary prevention in cardiac outpatients. Her research centers on the health impact of individual CBT, group CBT, MBSR, and peer support interventions among cardiac patients.

 

Annual Meeting Activity Coordinator: Joyline Chepkorir, PhD, MSc, BSN, RN
Dr. Chepkorir is a Post-doctoral Fellow at the Johns Hopkins School of Nursing. She earned her doctorate in Nursing from Johns Hopkins University, a Master of Science in Global Health Policy from the University of Edinburgh, Scotland, and a Bachelor of Science in Nursing from Michigan State University.
Her research interests are centered around community-engaged research, digital and health literacy, chronic disease prevention and control, global health, and health equity. Her post-doctoral fellowship research aims to prevent and manage diabetes, hypertension, obesity, and overweight among Black and Latino adults in Maryland, Virginia, and Washington D.C.

 

Trainee Member: Zachary Magin
Zachary Magin is a clinical health postdoctoral resident at VA Connecticut Healthcare System in West Haven. He completed his PhD in clinical psychology at the University of Connecticut and his clinical internship at VA Connecticut. His research broadly focuses on psychological (e.g., perceived control, stress, coping) and behavioral (e.g., physical activity, sleep) risk and protective factors for cardiovascular disease.

 

Trainee Member: Morgann West
Morgann West studies how chronic stressors, including depression, sleep disturbances, and neighborhood environmental factors, shape health outcomes. She is particularly interested in cardiovascular disease prevention among racial and ethnic minorities and adults coping with spousal bereavement. From 2022 to 2023, she earned a Master of Arts (MA) in Clinical Psychology at Northwestern University Feinberg School of Medicine, where she contributed to the RESTore Plus (REST to Overcome Loss and REduce Risk) study, a pilot randomized controlled trial testing a behavioral sleep intervention for recently bereaved adults, with Dr. Diana Chirinos. Morgann is a fourth-year clinical psychology doctoral student at Northwestern, where she conducts research under the mentorship of Dr. Allison Carroll.

 

Description/Mission Statement

The Cardiovascular Disease (CVD) SIG is dedicated to advancing efforts to reduce the public health burden of CVD and promote behaviors that enhance cardiovascular health.

The SIG will focus on research and other efforts to improve CVD health and quality of life among those with, or at risk for, CVD (e.g., heart failure, coronary heart disease, stroke, peripheral artery disease). 

The scope of work supported includes, but is not limited to: 

• Primordial and primary prevention through the targeted lens of CVD mechanisms or risk reduction
• Theoretical topics and theoretical model development or evaluation
• Identifying and exploring behavioral and psychological mechanisms of CVD
• Developing, testing, and disseminating evidence-based behavioral interventions
• Reducing cardiovascular health disparities
• Implementation science for cardiovascular behavioral health interventions
• Improving mental health, quality of life, functional capacity, and reducing disability among individuals with CVD; and 
• Advocating for public education and public policies that promote cardiovascular behavioral health across the lifespan.

To achieve this mission, the CVD SIG seeks to:

1. Engage leading scientists and practitioners in the field of cardiovascular behavioral medicine through collaboration, discussion, and distribution of relevant resources
2. Engage with family doctors, primary care practitioners, cardiologists, other care providers, and collaborators from other organizations
3. Disseminate cardiovascular behavioral medicine research at the annual meeting, through SIG newsletters, the listserv, and public-facing channels
4. Provide support to successfully secure extramural funding, career development and advancement, and mentorship opportunities to the SIG membership; and 
5. Recognize CVD SIG members' outstanding contributions in the field of cardiovascular behavioral medicine.

Read "Why We Do We Need a CVD SIG" in the Fall 2021 issue of Outlook.

 

CVD SIG Special Forum - February 16, 2024

 

 

CVD SIG Publications

Intensive Behavioral Counseling in Cardiovascular Care: Opportunities to Improve Health Equity

 

CVD SIG Policy Briefs

Increase Funding and Access for Intensive Behavioral Counseling to Reduce Cardiovascular Disease-Related Health Inequities

 

CVD SIG Healthy Living Articles

How Heart Disease Affects Intimacy, Sexual Health, and Wellbeing

How Sleep Affects Mind, Body, and Heart Health

Improve Your Cardiovascular Health

How Stress Affects Your Heart

Does Mental Health Affect Heart Problems?

Women’s Heart Health Part 1: What to Know about Women and Heart Disease across the Lifespan

Women’s Heart Health Part 2: Keys to Preventing Heart Disease and Managing Heart Health for Women

Women’s Heart Health, Part 3: Tips for Talking to your Doctor

 

CVD SIG Newsletter

January 2023

October 2022

July 2022