NIH Consensus Development Conference on
Vaginal Birth After Cesarean:
New Insights
March 8–10, 2010
Bethesda, Maryland
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Consensus Development Panel Bios
F. Gary Cunningham, M.D.
Panel and Conference Chairperson
Beatrice and Miguel Elias Distinguished
Chair in Obstetrics and Gynecology
Professor
Department of Obstetrics and Gynecology
University of Texas Southwestern Medical
Center at Dallas
Dallas, Texas
Dr. Cunningham is Professor and Beatrice and Miguel Elias Distinguished Chair in Obstetrics & Gynecology, Department of Obstetrics & Gynecology, The University of Texas Southwestern Medical Center in Dallas. He is a Diplomate of the American Board of Obstetrics and Gynecology, Division of Maternal-Fetal Medicine, a Fellow of the American College of Obstetricians and Gynecologists and serves as an examiner for the American Board of Obstetricians and Gynecologists. He is senior editor for the 18th to 23rd editions of Williams Obstetrics, and an editor of Chesley’s Hypertensive Disorders in Pregnancy, Williams Gynecology, Operative Obstetrics, and Williams Manual of Obstetrics. He has also published numerous clinical research papers as well as reviews and book chapters. His areas of interest are preeclampsia and other hypertensive disorders of pregnancy, medical and surgical disorders complicating pregnancy, and maternal physiology during pregnancy.
Shrikant I. Bangdiwala, Ph.D.
Dr. Bangdiwala is a professor in the Department of Biostatistics at the University of North Carolina (UNC) at Chapel Hill. He has extensive experience in the design, conduct and analysis of multicenter studies, having worked on clinical trials in congestive heart failure, cardiovascular risk factors, functional bowel disease, and cancer prevention. Dr. Bangdiwala also has extensive experience as a member of various data and safety monitoring boards for studies in ophthalmology, HIV/AIDS, and cardiology. He collaborates with investigators at the UNC Center for Functional GI and Motility Disorders on studies of functional bowel disease, with investigators in the UNC Injury Prevention Research Center on studies of child abuse and family violence, with investigators in the UNC Center for Health Promotion and Disease Prevention on studies of obesity and lifestyle interventions, and with investigators in the UNC Sheps Center for Health Services Research. Dr. Bangdiwala is currently designated as a “Fulbright Senior Specialist” in Global Public Health and a member of the Board of Scientific Counselors of the National Center for Injury Prevention and Control at the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention. He holds faculty positions in universities in Chile and has taught extensively overseas. His statistical research interests include nonparametric methods, methodology for clinical trials, reliability and validity of diagnostic tests, and graphical methods for descriptive analyses.
Sarah S. Brown, M.S.P.H.
Sarah Brown is the CEO of the National Campaign to Prevent Teen and Unplanned Pregnancy, an independent non-profit organization working to promote values, behavior, and policies that reduce both teen pregnancy and unplanned pregnancy, especially among single young adults. The National Campaign began in 1996 with a crisp focus on preventing teen pregnancy and, over the last decade and more, helped the nation in reducing the teen pregnancy rate by one-third. Its new goal for teen pregnancy is an additional one-third reduction by 2015. In 2007, the National Campaign expanded its mission to include young adults, where rates of unplanned pregnancy remain high. Before helping to found the Campaign, Ms. Brown was a senior study director at the Institute of Medicine, where she led numerous studies in the broad field of maternal and child health. Her last major report there resulted in the landmark book, The Best Intentions: Unintended Pregnancy and the Well-being of Children and Families. She has served on advisory boards of many influential national organizations, including the Guttmacher Institute, the Population Advisory Board of the David and Lucile Packard Foundation, the American College of Obstetricians and Gynecologists, the DC Mayor's Committee on Reducing Teenage Pregnancies and Out-of Wedlock Births, and Teen People magazine. She holds an undergraduate degree from Stanford University and a Master’s in Public Health degree from the University of North Carolina.
Thomas Michael Dean, M.D.
Dr. Dean received his M.D. with distinction in research from the University of Rochester School of Medicine in Rochester, New York in 1972. His internship and family practice residency were completed at the University of Washington Hospital in Seattle, Washington. Dr. Dean returned to his native Wessington Springs, South Dakota in 1978 as a National Health Service Corps physician. He sees patients at the clinics in Wessington Springs, Woonsocket, and Plankinton. Dr. Dean is board certified in family medicine and specializes in child and adult medicine, geriatrics, orthopedics and trauma, and preventive medicine. He works part-time on issues of health policy and medical leadership. He is a past president of the National Rural Health Assn, currently serves on the Medicare Payment Advisory Commission (MedPAC) and in 2009 was named Rural Practitioner of the Year by the National Rural Health Association.
Marilynn Frederiksen, M.D.
Dr. Frederiksen received her undergraduate degree from Cornell College in Mount Vernon, Iowa and her medical degree from Boston University School of Medicine. She had residency training in pediatrics at the University of Maryland School of Medicine and in obstetrics and gynecology at the Boston Hospital for Women of Harvard University. Following her residency, she had a clinical fellowship in maternal fetal medicine and a research fellowship in clinical pharmacology at Northwestern. Dr. Frederiksen is board certified in obstetrics and gynecology, maternal fetal medicine, and clinical pharmacology. From 1989 through 1992, Dr. Frederiksen was a member of the National Institutes of Health (NIH) National Center for Research Resources General Clinical Research Center Committee, serving as Chair from 1992 through 1993. Also, she has served on a number of other NIH study sections and special review committees. Dr. Frederiksen’s research work on drugs used for pregnant asthmatics led to her being asked to serve on the 1991-1992 National Heart, Lung, and Blood Institute Task Force on Asthma and Pregnancy. This task force developed guidelines for the care and treatment of pregnant patients with asthma. In 1992, Dr. Frederiksen was invited to speak on Clinical Trials in Pregnancy at a Food and Drug Administration (FDA) symposium on Women in Clinical Trials and was an invited speaker at two workshops on pharmacokinetics in pregnancy that were held in 2000 by the Eunice Kennedy Shriver National Institute of Child Health and Human Development and by the FDA. Dr. Frederiksen gives a yearly lecture at the NIH in the course on Clinical Pharmacology on Drugs in Pregnancy.
Carol J. Rowland Hogue, Ph.D., M.P.H.
Dr. Hogue was appointed Professor of Epidemiology and Jules and Uldeen Terry Professor of Maternal and Child Health at the Rollins School of Public Health of Emory University in 1992. For a decade before that, she was at the federal Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) Division of Reproductive Health, where she was Chief of the Pregnancy Epidemiology Branch (1982-88) and then Director of the Division (1988-1992). Prior to her government service, she was on the Biometry faculty of Arkansas Medical School (1977-82) and the Biostatistics faculty of the University of North Carolina-Chapel Hill School of Public Health (1974-77). While at CDC, Dr. Hogue initiated many of the current CDC reproductive health programs, including the Pregnancy Risk Assessment Monitoring System (PRAMS), the National Pregnancy Mortality Surveillance System, and the National Infant Mortality Surveillance (NIMS) project that initiated the national and state-level development and use of linked birth and death records. Her ongoing research interests include the long-term effects of induced abortion, epidemiology of preterm delivery, and the impact of pregnancy complications on minority health. She has published broadly in maternal health, including studies of ectopic pregnancy, stillbirth, unintended pregnancy, contraceptive failure, and reproductive cancers. She has a longstanding interest in environmental impacts on reproductive health. Currently, she is Principal Investigator (PI) of the Emory Center in the Stillbirth Collaborative Research Network funded by the Eunice Kennedy Shriver National Institute of Child Health and Human Development, as well as PI of the Emory National Children’s Study Center for Wave 2.
Tekoa L. King C.N.M., M.P.H, FACNM
Tekoa King is Associate Clinical Professor in the department of Obstetrics, Gynecology and Reproductive Sciences at the University of California at San Francisco. She is the Deputy Editor for the Journal of Midwifery & Women's Health.
Emily Spencer Lukacz, M.D., M.A.S.
Dr. Lukacz focuses her efforts on evaluating and treating women with urinary incontinence, pelvic organ prolapse and other pelvic floor disorders. In addition to her strong commitment to improving quality of life for her patients, she is highly involved in clinical research activities so that she may provide the highest quality care. Her research interests include the evaluation of surgical procedures for stress incontinence and prolapse, as well as epidemiologic research on the causes of pelvic floor dysfunction.
Laurence B. McCullough, Ph.D.
Dr. McCullough is the Associate Director for Education and inaugural holder (since May 2008) of the Dalton Tomlin Chair in Medical Ethics and Health Policy in the Center for Medical Ethics and Health Policy, Baylor College of Medicine, where is he also Professor of Medicine and Medical Ethics. Dr. McCullough is also a Professor of Family and Community Medicine at Baylor and Faculty Associate of Baylor’s Huffington Center on Aging. Dr. McCullough teaches Baylor medical students and residents in Baylor’s affiliated hospitals, directs the clinical ethics elective of Baylor’s award-winning Ethics Track for its medical students, and teaches courses in medical humanities in the Department of Philosophy at Rice University in his capacity as Adjunct Professor of Philosophy. He directs the Ethics Consultation Program at St. Luke’s Episcopal Hospital, and serves on the ethics committees of the Michael E. DeBakey Veterans Affairs Medical Center, St. Luke’s, and Texas Children’s Hospital. He has published more than 400 publications in the peer-reviewed literature, including 158 on ethics in obstetrics and gynecology (with Frank A. Chervenak, M.D.).
Wanda Nicholson, M.D., M.P.H., M.B.A.
Dr. Nicholson is an Associate Professor of Obstetrics and Gynecology at the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill. Dr. Nicholson is a board-certified obstetrician-gynecologist and epidemiologist with a focus on women's and perinatal outcomes. She is a Fellow in the American College of Obstetricians and Gynecologists (ACOG) and is a member of the ACOG National Committee on Health Care for Underserved Women. Dr. Nicholson received her medical degree and completed internship and residency in obstetrics and gynecology from the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill. Following residency, she completed the Robert Wood Johnson Clinical Scholars Program at the University of California at San Francisco and obtained a master’s degree in epidemiology from the University of California at Berkeley. Her research focuses on the epidemiology of chronic conditions in women, including gestational diabetes, type 2 diabetes, obesity and the effect of depressive symptoms on health-related quality of life. She is the Principal Investigator for two cohort studies funded through the National Institute of Diabetes and Digestive and Kidney Diseases and the American Diabetes Association.
Nancy Frances Petit, M.D.
Dr. Petit received her medical degree from the Uniformed Services University of the Health Sciences and completed her internship and residency at the National Naval Medical Center. Having enjoyed a 20-year career as an obstetrician-gynecologist in the U.S. Navy, she is now Chief of Obstetrics at St. Francis Hospital in Newark, Delaware, and serves as staff obstetrician-gynecologist at the St. Francis OB/GYN Center. She currently serves as a Junior Fellow Advisor for the Armed Forces District in the American College of Obstetrics and Gynecology (ACOG), and has chaired and served on numerous ACOG committees in the past.
Jeffrey L. Probstfield, M.D.
Dr. Probstfield graduated from the University of Washington School of Medicine and did his clinical training at the University of Minnesota. He is a board-certified internist and clinical pharmacologist. He is a former Scientific Project Officer at the National Heart, Lung and Blood Institute for the Systolic Hypertension in the Elderly Program (SHEP), Post-Coronary Artery Bypass Graft (Post-CABG) and Asymptomatic Carotid Artery Progression Study (ACAPS) trials and was the Deputy Project Officer for the Studies of Left Ventricular Dysfunction (SOLVD). He served as the Project Director of the Women's Health Initiative Clinical Coordinating Center at the Fred Hutchinson Cancer Research Center between 1993 and 1995. In May 1995 he founded the Clinical Trials Service Unit in the Division of Cardiology at the University of Washington. He currently is Professor of Medicine at the University of Washington School of Medicine and Adjunct Professor of Epidemiology at the University of Washington School of Public Health.
Adele C. Viguera, M.D., M.P.H.
Dr. Viguera is a research faculty member of the Neurological Institute and Director of Women’s Mental Health at the Cleveland Clinic in Cleveland, Ohio. She is also an Assistant Professor of Psychiatry at Harvard Medical School and has served as the Associate Director of the Perinatal and Reproductive Psychiatry Clinical Research Program at Massachusetts General Hospital since 1997. Dr. Viguera received her undergraduate degree from Harvard University, her medical degree from Dartmouth Medical School, and her master’s degree in epidemiology from the Harvard School of Public Health. She completed her internship in medicine from Massachusetts General Hospital, residency training in psychiatry at McLean Hospital, and a fellowship in perinatal and reproductive psychiatry at Massachusetts General Hospital. Dr. Viguera’s research, teaching and clinical activities focus on women’s mental health, specifically psychiatric disorders across the female reproductive life cycle. Her research area is major mood disorders, in particular bipolar disorder.
Cynthia A. Wong, M.D.
Dr. Wong is a Professor of Anesthesiology at the Northwestern University Feinberg School of Medicine in Chicago. She is the Medical Director of Obstetric Anesthesiology at Northwestern Memorial Hospital and Director of the Obstetric Anesthesiology Fellowship Program at Northwestern University. Dr. Wong is Section Editor for Obstetric Anesthesia for Anesthesia & Analgesia and is on the editorial boards of the International Journal of Obstetric Anesthesia and the Obstetric Anesthesia Digest. She is the author of multiple book chapters on obstetric anesthesiology and has lectured worldwide. She has edited several major textbooks, including the 4th edition of Chestnut’s Obstetric Anesthesia, Principles and Practice. Her research interests revolve around labor analgesia and its effects on the progress of labor and fetal status, epidural labor analgesia, as well as anesthesia for cesarean delivery and postoperative analgesia.
Sheila Cohen Zimmet, B.S.N., J.D.
Ms. Zimmet is the Georgetown University Senior Associate Vice President for Regulatory Affairs. She previously served as Associate Dean for Research Integrity for Weill Cornell Medical College, until returning to Georgetown University in her current role. At Georgetown University, Ms. Zimmet has oversight responsibility for research integrity, protection of human and animal subjects of research, medical center conflict of interest management, environmental health and safety and the Clinical Trials Office. She is a former neonatal intensive care nurse, Senior Associate Counsel to the Georgetown University Medical Center, and the University’s first Director of Research Assurance and Compliance. Ms. Zimmet also is a former two-term member of the National Center for Research Resources (NCRR) Advisory Council (1996-2000 and 2004-2008) and a current member of the NCRR Chimpanzee Management Plan Working Group. She frequently speaks on issues related to research compliance matters at local, national and international professional meetings.
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