Vice Chair for Research, Department of Obstetrics and Gynecology
Director, Institute for Public Health and Medicine (IPHAM) – Center for Health Equity Transformation

Dr. Simon’s primary research interests are aimed at promoting health equity and eliminating health disparities among low income, medically underserved women across the lifespan. Integrating health services research with social epidemiologic models, Dr. Simon’s research focuses on interventions (such as patient navigation and community health outreach workers) that aim to reduce and eliminate such disparities. Within this context, Dr. Simon prefers to leverage culture and community to achieve these goals and thereby integrates community based participatory research framework into her work. She also has a strong portfolio of workforce development programs including the world’s first healthcare pipeline development free massive open online course, “Career 911: Your Future Job in Medicine and Healthcare” on the Coursera platform. She is the founding director of the Center for Health Equity Transformation and the Chicago Cancer Health Equity Collaborative. Finally, she serves as a member of the US Preventive Services Task Force (USPSTF) and the National Academy of Medicine’s Roundtable for the Promotion of Health Equity.