Welcome to the Department of Quantitative Health Sciences
The vision of the Department of Quantitative Health Sciences (QHS) is to improve population and individual health by transforming health care delivery through methodological innovation and to become a nationally and internationally recognized resource for translational research. The Department has a three-pronged mission:
- to fulfill the quantitative health science needs of the academic medical center as it moves towards its vision of becoming a leader in clinical and translational research;
- to train the next generation of scientists that will fulfill the Vision; and
- to weave service to the academic medical center into discovery of new approaches to solve the health care needs of the nation and world.
History and Future
The Department Chair, Catarina Kiefe, PhD, MD, and Vice Chair, Jeroan Allison, MD, MScEpi, arrived on the UMMS campus in June 2009. As of July, 2011, we have recruited 32 faculty with a primary appointment in QHS into our 4 Divisions; an additional 22 faculty members from other departments hold secondary appointments in QHS. We project that we will reach a steady state of 35-40 primary faculty by the Fall of 2015.
QHS faculty are independent investigators, collaborative methodologists, or both. QHS primary faculty are currently principal investigators on 25 active extramural grants and contracts amounting to a total funding of $30.5 million. During the academic year 2010/11, QHS primary faculty published over 180 peer-reviewed manuscripts. The Quantitative Methods Core, a service unit for methodological research support and data management, is housed in QHS. Since its inception in February, 2010 through June, 2011, the Core provided consultation to 88 investigators from 26 Departments and 18 Divisions across the UMMS campus.
The doctoral program in Clinical and Population Health Research is housed in QHS, as is the Masters of Science in Clinical Investigation. These two programs are part of the Graduate School of Biomedical Sciences at UMMS; about 80 faculty across UMMS are affiliated with these teaching programs.
The Department of Quantitative Health Sciences is currently housed in the new Ambulatory Care Center (ACC), a seven-story, 258,000-square-foot building connected to the South Road Parking Garage. In early 2013, QHS is scheduled to move into the new Albert Sherman Center. The center is an interdisciplinary state-of-the-art research and education facility that will foster interaction and collaboration among scientists.
10/2012