Executive Committee 2020
Natalia Rodriguez – Conference Co-Chair
Sarah Chowdhury – Conference Co-Chair
Carlos A. Perez Aldana – Program Chair
Munir Buhaya – Funding and Grants Chair
Humsini Viswanath – Logistics Chair
Executive Committee Bios:
Natalia Rodriguez – Conference Co-Chair
Natalia is a 2nd year MPH student in Epidemiology at UT School of Public Health in Houston planning to focus her studies in Global Health. She graduated from The University of Houston in 2017 with a B.S. in Mathematical Biology.
Natalia became involved with the Partnership for the Advancement and Immersion of Refugees, PAIR since 2015. Her time with the organization inspired her to become involved in local community outreach projects and discover new opportunities in public health advocacy. She aims to showcase global health initiatives intersected across academic and medical institutions in the Texas Medical Center at the conference.
Sarah Chowdhury- Conference Co-Chair
Sarah is a 3rd year MPH student in Epidemiology with a concentration in Global Health at the UT School of Public Health. She previously graduated from the University of Texas at Austin with majors in Biology and Psychology.
Sarah is passionate about global health and aims to organize the conference to bring people together from many different backgrounds and organizations and work towards a common goal. She wants to engage more students and professionals of all backgrounds to attend the conference to share their knowledge and experience in this area and help bring important global health issues to focus.
Chris Wong – Program Chair
Chris is a 2nd year medical student currently pursuing the Global Health Pathway at Baylor College of Medicine. He graduated from the University of Houston in 2018 with a B.A. in Liberal Studies and French and a B.S. in Biology.
Chris recognizes the importance of studying social determinants of health and the role of policy in reducing health disparities.
Carlos A. Perez Aldana – Program Chair
Carlos is a doctoral student at UTHealth School of Biomedical Informatics in Houston, TX. He previously graduated from Universidad El Bosque at Bogota, Colombia with a B.S. in Electronics Engineering from Universidad Politécnica de Madrid in Spain with a Masters in Telemedicine and EHealth.
Carlos has had the opportunity to study and work with international teams promoting the use of technologies to improve public health. These experiences motivated him to become involved with HGHC due to his career interests in informatics and information technologies and his passion for global health.
Munir Buhaya – Funding and Grants Chair
Munir is a 3rd year medical student at McGovern Medical School interested in pediatrics and global health. He graduated from the University of Texas at El Paso with a B.S. in Microbiology, and then he completed a Post-Baccalaureate fellowship at the National Institutes of Health.
His interest in global health arises from an early exposure to tropical infectious diseases in underdeveloped countries, in which he witnessed first-hand the burden of disease on disadvantaged communities. His involvement in HGHC is to advocate for the improvement of global health and wellbeing of children suffering from disease.
Tien Pham – Abstracts Chair
Tien is a 4th year Pharm.D student at the University of Houston. She is interested in understanding the role of professionals of different healthcare backgrounds in implementing solutions to global health problems.
Tien aims to create a friendly and open platform for conversations on global health issues. She also is focused on raising awareness about how future healthcare professionals in the TMC, can make an impact on healthcare for international communities.
Jason Lee – Technology Chair
Jason is a junior at Rice University studying Sociology. His research interests in global health are global aging, emerging global health innovations, as well as global mental health, especially dementia and how it affects aging societies.
Jason is dedicated to organizing a conference that allows attendees the opportunity to engage our community in discussing global health issues that affect both Houston and communities abroad and learn more about the various innovative global health initiatives in the TMC. He aims to raise awareness of global health disparities and encourage participants to build connections and form partnerships with others who have similar global health interests.
Humsini Viswanath- Logistics Chair
Humsini is a 3rd year medical student at Texas A&M College of Medicine. Before, she attended UTHealth School of Public Health and received an MPH in Epidemiology and Global Health. Humsini completed her undergraduate degree at UC Berkeley in Cognitive Science Global Poverty & Practice. In the future, she hopes to practice medicine and conduct research in the US and abroad.
Humsini believes HGHC is a great way to open up avenues for collaboration between academics, researchers, students, physicians, and non-profits within the TMC and Texas to promote global health research and education and improve the quality of health care locally and abroad.