On October 9, 2014, the American University of Armenia (AUA) School of Public Health (SPH) organized a Public Health Seminar with Dr. David Wegman. Dr. Wegman gave a presentation on “Challenges for Occupational Epidemiology in the 21st Century”. Public health students, alumni, faculty, researchers, and other guests were present during the seminar. Following Dr. Wegman’s presentation, the audience asked questions and commented on the situation in Armenia regarding Occupational Epidemiology.
David H. Wegman is a Professor Emeritus in the Department of Work Environment at the University of Massachusetts Lowell and Adjunct Professor at the Harvard School of Public Health. He was founding chair of the Department of Work Environment as well as Dean of the School of Health and Environment from 2003-2008. Previously he served on the faculty at the Harvard School of Public Health and as Division Chair of Occupational and Environmental Health at UCLA School of Public Health. Prior to his academic career he served in the US Public Health Service as an epidemiologist and in the Massachusetts state government as Occupational Hygiene Physician. Currently he serves as a member of the board of directors of the Alpha Foundation for the Improvement of Mine Safety and Health and a consultant to the Massachusetts State Department of Health.
He received his BA from Swarthmore College and both his MD and MSc from Harvard University. Dr. Wegman’s epidemiologic research includes over 200 publications on acute and chronic occupational respiratory disease, occupational cancer risk and occupational musculoskeletal disorders and in surveillance of occupational conditions and risks. He was named a National Associate of the National Research Council in 2002, and is a member of the National Academy of Science (NAS) Board on Human Systems Integration and a member of the Institute of Medicine (IOM) Committee on Aerospace Medicine and the Medicine of Extreme Environments in 2011.
Dr. Wegman has served on or chaired a number of ad hoc Academy committees, on subjects including self-escape from mining disasters, work-related musculoskeletal disorders (MSDs), occupational health and operational medicine in homeland security, human factors in home health care, and assessment of federal research in occupational health, and health and safety of older workers and of adolescent workers. He now is serving on a committee examining fatigue on commercial drivers’ safety and health.
In 1998 he was awarded a Fulbright Senior Fellowship for study of Health and Safety of Older workers in Sweden and then, in 2006 he was appointed chair of the International Evaluation Group for an analysis of Occupational Health Research in Sweden. He is co editor of Occupational and Environmental Health: Recognition and Prevention of Disease and Injury, the 6th edition of which was published in 2011.
The AUA School of Public Health works actively to improve the health of the populace and health services in Armenia and the region through interdisciplinary education and development of public health professionals and others to be leaders in public health, health services research and evaluation, and health care delivery and management.
Dr. David Wegman