The Massachusetts Department of Public Health (DPH), Bureau of Community Health and Prevention (BCHAP) and Office of Statistics and Evaluation (OSE) is seeking an experienced senior epidemiologist to coordinate and manage all evaluation, surveillance, research, and data analysis initiatives for the Massachusetts Tobacco Cessation and Prevention Program (MTCP) and the heart disease, stroke, and diabetes programs within the Division of Health Protection and Promotion (DHPP). This position will lead a team of 5 epidemiologists and work collaboratively with division leadership and program staff to fulfill these functions. The position will effectively and collaboratively:

• Coordinate and manage Epi II and Epi I staff that support individual division programs, providing technical leadership, mentorship, and professional development opportunities for staff.
• Provide leadership, guidance, and review of division-wide data initiatives, frameworks, data products such as factsheets, reports, peer reviewed manuscripts and communication products that align with division priorities.
• Work as part of division senior teams to provide strategic and thought leadership on division-level strategic planning or interdisciplinary cross-divisional initiatives and collaborations.
• Work as part of OSE senior team to provide OSE-wide cross-cutting support such as participation on DPH-wide data working groups, facilitation of OSE staff meetings, participation of strategic planning efforts, and other requests from Bureau, DPH, or EOHHS leadership, as needed.

The Integrated Chronic Disease Epidemiologist III will also apply a structural analysis of systemic and historical racism and resulting inequities to their work, in alignment with the principles and practices of the BCHAP Racial Equity Movement. This includes understanding the root causes of health inequities, particularly the role of structural racism and other systemic drivers of health, and incorporating a racial equity lens in data collection, analyses, evaluation, and dissemination materials.

Duties and Responsibilities (These duties and responsibilities are not all inclusive)

• Work closely with the OSE deputy director and MTCP/DHPP leadership to identify divisional epidemiological needs related to chronic disease prevention and promotion of healthy systems and environments.
•  Develop of strategic plans and data informed prioritization of initiatives/resources.
•  Supervise and mentor epidemiological staff.
• Create, coordinate, and review communication and dissemination materials produced for diverse audiences.
• Support divisional epidemiological needs through the coordination and management of grant writing, oversight, and management.
• Infuse a health equity framework in all surveillance analyses, evaluation plans, strategic plans, dissemination materials, QI/QA projects, etc.
• Create and/or refine surveillance and evaluation mixed methods approaches and techniques.
• Improve data quality and collection through outreach, data quality analysis, and working with data providers.
• Work with internal and external partners to maximize chronic disease and risk factor data dissemination by working on reports, data requests, peer reviewed publications, presentations, and other activities as required.
• Respond to all CDC requests and grant reporting stipulations as required, including maintenance of contracts, preparation of progress reports and administrative duties as required.
• Manage division-level related evaluation contracts and budgets and support staff in management of program-specific evaluation contracts.
• Participate in BCHAP and OSE staff meetings and working groups to improve surveillance and monitoring systems and to provide feedback on activities, as well as enhancing the utilization of data resources, as well as any CDC grant project meetings, as needed.

• Proficiency in biostatistics and survey / study design and development.
• Knowledge of the principles and practices of epidemiology including principles of biology and disease processes.
• Demonstrated experience with the methods of statistical and scientific report writing.
• Capacity to oversee databases, construct data files, conduct and support data entry, and perform data edits/cleaning as needed.
• Ability to perform duties efficiently under tight deadlines, and to manage competing priorities during such situations.

Preferred Qualifications:

• Demonstrated expertise or strong potential to acquire expertise in the built environment, tobacco control/prevention, community clinical linkages, integrated chronic disease prevention, measurement of behavioral risk factors, population health management, integration of multidisciplinary clinical team members (like community health workers), EMR data, partnership evaluation, program evaluation, and policy evaluation.
• Established expertise in robust quantitative and qualitative epidemiologic methods including but not limited to: survey design, tools (i.e. REDCap), and methods (including novel methods to reach historically marginalized populations), quasi-experimental study designs, local and statewide PSE (policy, systems, and environment) evaluation methods, and other real-world based, population-level evaluation methods and health equity-centered evaluation approaches.
• Demonstrated proficiency in advanced statistical programming, data analysis, and data visualization skills in multiple programs including SAS, ArcGIS, R, Tableau, etc.
• Strong understanding of the structural drivers for health and how systems of advantage/oppression impact health.
•  A demonstrated history of participating, informing and/or facilitating data-driven, health equity-centered strategic planning exercises together with programmatic staff and stakeholders.
•  A strong history of working with programmatic staff and non-technical stakeholders collaboratively, harmoniously, and in a coordinated manner to co-create shared implementation plans, presentations, reports, dashboards, and other synergistic initiatives and products.
• A demonstrated history of coordinating work with the CDC, academic research partners, external partner agencies, external evaluation vendors, managing vendor contracts and budgets, and coordinating responses to federal, state, and/or local data and public records requests.
• Strong scientific writing skills and health communication skills across a range of audiences (eg. peer review to lay persons).
•  A strong history of working translationally across content areas.
• Evidenced history of effective staff supervision and mentoring.
• A demonstrated history of effective community and stakeholder engagement
• Established expertise with multiple health data sets including but not limited to: the Behavioral Risk Factor Surveillance System, the Youth Health Survey, the Youth Risk Behavior Survey, Hospital Discharge Datasets (casemix), MassGIS layers, Claims data, EMR data, American Community Survey, etc.

About Massachusetts Department of Public Health

Massachusetts Department of Public Health (DPH) keeps people healthy and communities strong. We make it safe to eat and drink in Massachusetts, we prevent illness and disease, we give children a healthy start, we help respond to emergencies, and we promote wellness and health equity for all people. DPH also oversees a wide range of professions and services related to health care. Information is available for residents, providers, researchers, and stakeholders. DPH is an accredited health department approved by the national Public Health Accreditation Board (PHAB).

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