Roundtables

Round Table Descriptions:

Round Table 1.  SPER meets ECHO – Tania Lombo

In 2016, NIH launched a new seven-year initiative called the Environmental influences on Child Health Outcomes (ECHO) program. ECHO is supporting multiple, synergistic, longitudinal studies using existing cohorts, to investigate environmental exposures — including physical, chemical, biological, social, behavioral, natural and built environments — on child health and development. The NIH ECHO program focus on positive health and four key pediatric outcome areas that have a high public health impact: 1) Upper and lower airway, 2) Obesity, 3) Pre-, peri-, and postnatal outcomes and 4) Neurodevelopment. One of the primordial goals of this program is to create an ECHO-wide Cohort that combines existing and new data from diverse populations of children to answer important questions about the origins of their long-term health. The ECHO Program also supports a 17-state clinical trials network to test prevention and treatment strategies among children from rural and medically underserved backgrounds.  This round table will provide the opportunity to learn about this NIH initiative, and how it is aiming to contribute to the pediatric research by discussing the ECHO platform potential impact to the research community.

Round Table 2.  Epidemiologic perspectives on physiologic pregnancy and childbirth: a growing field of epidemiologic inquiry – Jon Snowden

While studies focusing on pregnancy and obstetric complications abound, epidemiologists have devoted limited attention to the science of physiologic childbirth. Yet knowledge of the latter is a prerequisite to understand and define the former. Physiologic childbirth research has grown considerably in recent years, a trend that is likely to continue. Perinatal epidemiology focuses on the distribution and determinants of health-related states – not just diseases – so we are well-suited to lead in this field. This round table will highlight the multi-disciplinary movement toward physiologic childbirth research (including high-impact findings on labor progression and defining “low-risk” pregnancy), and how our epidemiologic concepts and tools will be central in advancing this research.

Round Table 3.  Teaching reproductive, perinatal, and pediatric epidemiology – challenges & obstacles to training the next generation – Michael Bloom 

What readings, case studies, exercises, and approaches are most effective for engaging graduate students and generating excitement and enthusiasm; which are ineffective?  What fundamental or emerging issues are critical topics for inclusion in every course syllabus?  Come share your thoughts and experiences, as an instructor or as a student, and together we’ll become more effective teachers and build a bright future for our discipline!

* NOTE:  Attendance at the Round Table Discussions is open; no pre-registration is necessary.