The HPP Podcast

In this episode, HPP’s Photovoice Special Issue Editors Dr. Robin Evans-Agnew & Dr. Bob Strack are in conversation with Dr. Mary Ann Burris, a co-founder of Photovoice. They discuss the origin story of Photovoice, including Caroline Wang’s awareness of power and her mother’s influence. They explore Dr. Mary Ann Burris’s career, and they compare their own journeys to contend with the definition of change as activist scholars.

In this episode, Tara Maudrie is in conversation with Leialoha Ka‘ula and Jonathan Cruz about their project planting Kalo on the continent. They discuss their ancestral connection to Kalo and how the garden is not just a space for growing food, but it's also a way to perpetuate their culture. They explain how growing Kalo has become a metaphor for their organization; it’s reflective of their ability to adapt, be resilient, and to continue on despite the hardships that they encounter. The garden has allowed them to build a relationship with the community, other Hawaiians on the continent, and other Native communities as a way to decolonize and dismantle Western ideologies that they were forced to assimilate to.

In this episode, Dr. Cassandra Nguyen is in conversation with Dr. LaVerne Demientieff, Harleigh Moore-Wilson, and Makynna Sharp regarding their food sovereignty projects. They discussed the loss of traditional knowledge through colonization, and creating spaces for elders to reconnect and build relationships back with activities and skills to learn and share the knowledge to future generations. They explored Osage’s mobile market that aims to create new systems that are uniquely Indigenous and support ending food insecurity in their community and beyond. They also discussed growing traditional and endangered seeds for more nutritional food staples, and a return to Native produce.

“Arts and prescription is such an important model on its own, and it's also an example of what we can do when we allow ourselves to imagine that things can be different than they have been.”

In this episode, Dr. Tasha Golden discusses what “arts on prescription” is, what we’ve learned about it from research and emerging models, and why it matters for improving community and whole-person health. She encourages us to imagine what it means to have well being and what it would look like if our health care systems/providers were a part of not only that absence of disease, but the presence of well being in people's lives.

In this episode, Dr. Anji Buckner-Capone and Dr. Marcelle Dougan discuss college students' perceptions on COVID-19 vaccine mandates and their vaccine hesitancy. They remind us of the need to accessibility and trust when researching contentious topics, and their neutral language allowed students to express their polarizing views.

"We just want people who menstruate to be able to do so safely and with dignity, and we don't think that's so big of an ask."

In this episode, Dr. Allison Casola, Dr. Kierstin Luber, and Dr. Amy Henderson Riley discuss period poverty from an epidemiologic approach by considering three components: person, place, and time. They also identify policy opportunities, vulnerable populations, and the siloing of menstrual equity and reproductive education. The first step is increasing awareness, which is made easier by their glossary and other publications.

In this episode, Dr. LeConté Dill and Dr. Shanaé Burch are in conversation with Dr. Duduzile Ndlovu about their experience as a poet and academic. They discuss decolonization, disrupting systems, and the value of art in research to create the space for multiple narratives.

"The community health worker is under utilized, and yet can be the best glue across that continuum."

In this episode, Ysabel Duron and Dr. Manali Patel discuss the importance of community health workers (CHWs) in cancer care delivery. They talk about the unique capacity of CHW to identify the actual gaps and actual needs of patients to support and work in tandem with doctors.

"The way that people talk about immigrants in the news media affects those internalized stereotypes and, also, real fears that construct or limit somebody's mobility."

In this episode, Dr. Mario Alberto Viveros Espinoza-Kulick and Dr. Alex Espinoza-Kulick explore how the news media impacts the content and context of health access and decision-making among Latinx immigrant and Indigenous communities. They remind us that we need more immigration policies that center the health, well being, and dignity of migrant communities. Their research emphasizes the interconnectedness of immigration policy and public health, urging policymakers to evaluate immigration laws based on their impact on the health of communities, especially immigrant and Indigenous peoples.

In this episode, Dr. Melissa Valerio-Shewmaker is in conversation with Dr. Amelie G. Ramirez on her commentary that encourages us to look for upstream solutions and utilize promotoras. Dr. Ramirez also situates her approach in her own upbringing and to help us understand the barriers and disadvantages to health, as well as the need for more Latinos with advanced degrees for representation and culturally relevant care.

In this episode, Cynthia Begay is in conversation with Dr. Diane McEachern and Lauren White about their research in rural northwest Alaska Native villages on the quantities, types, sources, and frequency of support that Alaska Native youth and young adults had. They discuss the impact of colonization on education, and they reaffirm the existing support that occurs in Native communities. Furthermore, they offer ways that research can be more nuanced for Native communities to perhaps better measure support for males, use traditional milestone markers instead of age, pivot away from Western terms like informal and formal supports, and focus on involving the whole community.

"We want to have a dialogue about developing the capacity to grapple with political dysfunction. We need to be able to win political battles in order to save lives."

In this episode, Dr. Marcus Cheatham, Dr. Heidi Hancher-Rauch, Dr. Jodi Brookins-Fisher, Dr. Alexis Blavos, and Dr. Amy Thompson help us explore how the current political landscape has led to a poor national response to the pandemic. They remind us that public health professionals have a role to play as advocates, and they help us understand the matrix used in their commentary space.

"If you ask me, the most important thing is: who is at the table and who's not, right? Because –who is at the table and who's not?– determines what's on the agenda and the values that are underlying whatever's going on. So the most important structural intervention that you could make is to involve people who have a strong interest in whatever the proceeding is or whatever the effort's going to be, to be at the decision making table."

"It's really important to have people do the work, the slow work often, of walking around a neighborhood, in this case, and really looking at what's actually on the ground, literally, like, where are the cigarette butts, where are things happening, what does the safety look like?"

In this episode, Dr. Maya Vijayaraghavan and Dr. Margaret Handley discuss clean air policies that limit indoor smoking in subsidized housing. They break down their multi-method approach which allows for a comprehensive approach to policy questions that expands past individual behaviors and recognizes the policy, environmental, and social context of behavior change and the need to intervene at each of these levels to facilitate behavior change. They remind us that ground truthing can help unpack and develop non-coercive incentive-based programs and policies with buy in from residents and staff.

In this episode, Dr. Terry O’Toole, René Lavinghouze, and Dr. LaNita Wright discuss the 5 Priority Actions that states and communities can take to prevent serious chronic diseases, which are designed to improve the environments in which children, adults, and families can access healthy choices or live in places where it's easier to be healthy. They also explained the five program infrastructure themes that allowed recipients to pivot and remain nimble when COVID-19 placed pressure on the environment and implementation context. The CDC’s funding enabled many of the first-time writers to participate in writing workshops to demystify publishing, connect with subject matter experts, remove the barriers to writing resources, and battle imposter syndrome.

"What mobility justice means to me is that people feel safe, people have access, and people have voice when accessing public resources. And it's not just a system that they use, but a system that they engage in and participate in growing based on what their needs are."

In this episode, Karishama Vahora discusses their paper on mobility justice and engaging youth of color in decision making and policy making. Their paper aimed to start conversations around how we create equitable spaces for young people to 1) share their lived experiences with social services and 2) access different resources that we should all have access to. She reminds us to get involved, mobilize our support system, and build relationships with mentors.

In this episode, Dr. Robin Evans-Agnew is in conversation with Dr. Juan Aguilera, Jessica LeClair, and De-Ann Sheppard on Planetary Health and Climate Justice. They discuss the interconnectedness of the planet, as well as multidisciplinary approaches to affect change. They encourage us to take a holistic view of the planet’s health, and to generate meaningful relationships with community members most impacted by climate injustices in order to work in solidarity with them.

“Having that local context is always important when we're trying to meet the needs of a community because their context matters. Their lives matter. What they need matters. We need to listen to them… We can't just act. We need to know what's happening and how they wanna be supported.”

“I think it's important to know that you don't need, I guess, like big institutions or a lot of money or a ton of experience even sometimes to accomplish really great things. As long as you're able to really form that partnership and really utilize those around you, a lot can happen.”

In this episode, Cynthia Begay is in conversation with Dr. Anthony Fleg, Nicolette Abeyta, and Ashleigh Claw. They discuss their paths in public health, how running fits into cultural practices, and the holistic approach of the program. They walk us through the paper, along with their experiences of being first time writers and trailblazers by conducting research with the Native Health Initiative, which does not typically do research.

In this episode, Leo Kattari is in conversation with Dr. Hale Thompson and Reyna Ortiz regarding what they learned about transgender mental health and health inequities from running their pilot intervention. They discuss the Tips and Tools generated by TaskForce, the importance of centering community, and their multi-level approach to facing systemic inequities.

In this episode, Leo Kattari is in conversation with Lauren Cikara, Daniel Martinez, and Noah Jansen about their contributions to the special PRIDE collection of Practice Notes for HPP highlighting addressing health equity among LGBTQ+ youth and communities. They remind us of the power and eagerness of youth to get involved, the roles of adults in working beside youth, and to relish queer and trans joy!

"I've been using poetry in my work for a long time because it allows me to share the pieces of me that were not invited by academia and that have been left out and pushed to the cracks purposefully." - Dr. Amber Johnson

"In order to be in this space, I'm going to need poetry and poetry is always with me." - Dr. Bettina Judd

In this episode, Dr. Shanaé Burch is in conversation with Dr. Amber Johnson and Dr. Bettina Judd about their poems published in the Poetry for the Public's Health section. They discuss the role of poetry in public health, what it is like writing from the margins, and the experience of writing an abstract for a poem. They end by reminding us to read and rest.

"I am a student of photovoice in what I learn about my own heart and in what I learn from the people who take photographs, tell stories, and advocate to policy makers... Had it been in my power, I would have given you the moon."

In this episode, Dr. Caroline Wang reads aloud her paper, which was selected as a 2022 Health Promotion Practice's Paper of the Year winner. Her introspection and reflection on life and place are timeless, and she talks about the inception of photovoice – initially called "photo novella" – as a tool for empowerment education.

In this episode, Dr. Angela Sy, Mavis Nitta, Dioreme Navasca, Va’atausili Tofaeono, and Inou Shomour discuss their project in American Samoa and Federated States of Micronesia to increase healthy beverage consumption. They remind us of the effects of colonization, as well as the resilience of the community. Their intentional approach to evaluation bridges Indigenous knowledge and Western research principles as a proof of concept; there are ways to be unobtrusive and rigorous.

"CBPR is more than these tenants of what constitutes community engaged research. It's about really thinking about how you are going to demonstrate your commitment to a community... and to keep that respect intact regardless of what the institute might demand of you, because they're often at odds. And I think that keeping that front and center really shows your commitment to the process and your authentic respect of the process."

In this episode, Mory Chhom is in conversation with Dr. Jerusha Nelson-Peterman, Dr. Lindiwe Sibeko, Nora Tang, and Dr. Lorraine Cordeiro. They discuss the Cambodian experience in Lowell, Massachusetts, as well as how they navigate the predictable and unpredictable challenges of being insiders and outsiders. They close by reminding us what it means to do authentic community-based participatory research.

In this episode, guest host Mory Chhom discusses the perceived benefits and barriers in implementing an occupational health training program for nail salon workers in Philadelphia with Dr. Trân B Huỳnh, Tina Nguyễn, and Nancy Nguyen. They explain the recommended or required safety measures, as well as the health problems people experience when they are working in salons that do not follow the occupational health best practices. This work is an important example of how personal and political can be so interconnected and the value of community partnerships in tackling policy-level change.

In this episode, Dr. Keon Gilbert is in conversation with Dr. Darrell Hudson. Dr. Hudson's research aims to better understand why Black Americans do not get the same health returns that are associated with upward social mobility as White Americans. They help distinguish between historical and contemporary racism, and they also unpack hyper-vigilance and the anticipatory stress and expectations that come from negative racist experiences. They encourage us to think about the permanence of racism and its impact on stress and wealth.

In this episode, Liana Schreiber and Alex Groten discuss a pilot intervention in which public health practitioners provided technical assistance to managers/owners of small food retail stores in Minnesota in order to increase healthy options through a variety of strategies including minimum stocking standards. They help shift the perception that health departments' only function is to regulate the food retail space; public health can be a supportive, helpful partner to food retailers when co-creating an action plan on how to improve community health. Due to the partnerships and evaluation success, two of the stores were able to receive larger scale infrastructure grants.

"There's no single discipline that's gonna be able to really understand how structures and systems have been created to produce racial inequality in this country... Interdisciplinary collaboration is key to this work, particularly if we are focused on identifying and dismantling systemic racism."

In this episode, Dr. Keon Gilbert is in conversation with Dr. Brian Smedley, the Study Director at the Institute of Medicine for the landmark report entitled “Unequal Treatment: Confronting Racial and Ethnic Disparities in Health Care." Twenty years later, they reflect back on the paper as a beacon for HPP's “What is Antiracism in Health Promotion Practice?” series. Dr. Smedley calls for robust, comprehensive data collection, monitoring, and public reporting in order to monitor for access, quality of care, and outcomes of care. They also discuss the reallocation of healthcare resources and centering of community voices in the redesigning of these systems.

Other recently published papers in HPP’s What is Anti-Racism in Health Promotion Practice series: 

In this episode, Dr. LaNita S. Wright is in conversation with coauthors Dr. Juliet Iwelunmor and Dr. Jeanetta D. Sims about their paper in HPP's What Is Antiracism in Health Promotion Practice? series. They reflect on the finished product with feelings of openness, illumination, and value. They used Relational Dialectics to frame this piece and to help unpack their experiences as Black women in academia, accounting for multiple, often opposing, sides of the spectrum without having to resolve or reconcile or even to offer expansive recommendations about what to do with structures that were not built for them and may be still perpetuating injustices. They also note that letters can be used to heal, letters can be used to name, letters can be used to dismantle, and letters can be used to address.

In this episode, Shanaé Burch, Dr. LeConté Dill, and Dr. Ryan Petteway discuss their essay, other works, and behind the scenes of their process as the three associate editors of HPP's Poetry for the Public’s Health. They encourage us to question the ways that voices from the margins are smothered, all while lifting up others who inspire their vision and vibe and to celebrate Black History Month.

"Instead of training our public health students to work under the umbrella of a broken system or a system that can be greatly improved, it seems more efficient to turn the conversation and start to think through: how can we strengthen the funding organizations and their ability to support diverse scholars and diverse community orgs and projects to take a more proactive stance in leading to equity?"

In this episode, Dr. Liz Chen,  Dr. Deshira Wallace, Dr. Cristina Leos, and Dr. Yesenia Merino help us explore aspects of White supremacy culture and how it shows up in the grants process. They identify issues including power hoarding, perfectionism, urgency, and paternalism, as well as also offer some antidotes, like transparency, creativity, and reimagining the funding systems.

In this episode, host Andrea Bodkin talks with Katherine Seals, Jamila Freightman and Joetta Pitts to learn about a Community-Based Participatory Research approach to data collection in three parishes in rural Louisiana.

"Our main goal or argument is: HCV rates cannot be changed or eliminated if we cannot meaningfully reduce incarceration rates and our reliance on the carceral apparatus, and reallocating funds from this apparatus to community-based prevention efforts will bolster elimination efforts for Hepatitis C and also improve overall societal outcomes."

In this episode, Prashasti Bhatnagar and Sonia Canzater discuss the need for reinvestment into communities as a preventive approach to decrease incarceration, as well as destigmatization of those experiencing incarceration because it prevents allocation of resources. They also draw attention to the carceral apparatus's failure to provide healthcare and the resulting effects on communities.

In this episode, Dr. Melissa Valerio- Shewmaker is in conversation with Dr. Linda Sprague Martinez and Magalis Troncoso. They talk about the importance of maintaining humanity, getting out of our offices to engage with the community, food justice, and the role of food in community. They discuss language justice as it pertains to conducting their research in Spanish and Portuguese, and then translating their work into English for publication.

In this episode, host Andrea Bodkin explores patient-centered and dismissive communication with Dr. Grace Hildenbrand. Dr. Hildenbrand, and co-authors Dr. Evan Perrault and Rachel Rnoh, conducted a study that asked patients about interactions with their health care providers, and identified instances where patients perceived that they were dismissed by their providers. Andrea and Grace discuss the results of the study, and how patients and providers can use these results to further positive interactions.

In this episode, Cynthia Begay is in conversation with Brianna John, Robert Alsburg, and Carmen George. They discuss the recent paper that explores the resilience of Navajo Nation stores, as well as explain different systems in Navajo Nation to provide context. They remind us to support our local stores, support our communities, and thank our frontline workers.