Professor of Epidemiology
Rollins School of Public Health
Biography
Dr. Shakira Suglia’s research examines the impact of social determinants, focusing on violence, housing and neighborhood factors on health across the lifecourse. She is particularly interested in learning how these social factors can affect health through a stress pathway. Her current research examines how stress stemming from multiple social factors impacts cardio-metabolic health outcomes among Puerto Rican young adults living in the South Bronx, NY and the San Juan metro area in Puerto Rico. In this ethnically homogenous population living in two different social contexts, she will examine both factors that exacerbate the social stress and cardiometabolic health relation but also factors that may buffer the impact of stress on health. Dr. Suglia also leads the Disparities in Biological Aging study, part of the Child Health and Development Studies which examines the associations of childhood and adult socioeconomic status and social stressors on methylation age and telomere length in adulthood. This work can extend our understanding on how stress ‘gets under the skin’ to alter cardiometabolic health and other chronic health conditions.
Dr. Suglia served as the mentor for Dr. Andrea López-Cepero.