Program Director, MIRT Dr. Bizu Gelaye directs the Multidisciplinary International Research Training (MIRT) Program. The HSPH MIRT Program is a global public health research and training program that provides life-enriching experience to undergraduate and graduate students while working on major health problems with host researchers in developing countries. Dr. Bizu joined the department in November, 2011. He brings 8 years of experience as a program manager of multiple research and training grants at the University of Washington. Dr. Bizu earned his Master’s in Public Health from the University of Washington and is currently finishing his PhD in Epidemiology.

Dr. Bizu Gelaye’s research interests include a focus on: (1) assessing the comparative effectiveness of screening and diagnostic instruments for neuropsychiatric disorders in low and middle income countries; (2) integrating biological markers into clinical and population-based studies to identify factors that contribute to both resilience and risk of psychiatric disorders, (3) applying advanced epidemiologic and statistical methods in psychometric research; and (4) understanding the epidemiology of chronic non-communicable diseases in sub-Saharan Africa and Latin America. Dr. Gelaye have contributed to the design and execution of large scale biomarker-epidemiologic study of non-communicable disease risk factors in sub-Saharan Africa and South America. Dr. Gelaye have also contributed to the design and implementation of a multi-country sleep epidemiology study involving 10,000 university students in Asia, South America and sub-Saharan Africa. Recently, Dr. Gelaye led a study that evaluated the diagnostic validity of the Patient Health Questionnaire-9 and the Composite International Diagnostic Interview (CIDI) assessment instruments for depression in Addis Ababa, Ethiopia. In addition to my scientific contributions, Dr. Gelaye have been managing the HSPH Multidisciplinary International Research Training (MIRT/MHIRT) Program (formerly the UW MIRT/MHIRT) for the past ten years.