Shaina Johnson, MPH
RESEARCH FOCI: Health Inequities, Gender Based Violence, Marginalized Populations, Public Policy
Shaina Johnson, MPH - is a second-year doctoral student in the Robert Stemple School of Public Health Health Promotion program with a concentration in health disparities. Her major co- professors are Drs. Mariana Sanchez and Dionne Stephens. Shaina is a fellow with the FIU-Health Disparities Initiative, a NIMHD-funded initiative with the goal of training the next generation of doctoral level health disparities researchers. She received her bachelor’s degree in psychology and Spanish from Vanderbilt University and an MPH in Health Behavior from. The University of Alabama at Birmingham. Shaina has over nine years’ experience in the field of public health and most recently served as an HIV program consultant and legislative liaison for the Texas Department of State Health Services. She is currently conducting research focused on cardiometabolic outcomes in gender minority adolescents, transgender women of color and HIV (TRUST study), and the lived experiences of public health doctoral students.
Shaina is most passionate about eliminating structural barriers that impact health care access and utilization among gender minorities, specifically transgender women of color. Her long-term goals are to leverage her public health research experience and leadership skills to implement health policies that promote health equity within local communities
