Welcome to the Oregon BIRCWH
The Office of Research on Women's Health (ORWH), in the Director's Office of the National Institutes of Health (NIH), established the BIRCWH Program in 2002 to advance mentored research career development of junior faculty who will be engaged in interdisciplinary basic, behavioral, clinical, or health services research in women's health. The Oregon BIRCWH program is dedicated to training tomorrow's leaders in women's health research.
2023 Northwest Women's Health and Sex/Gender Differences Research Conference
Friday, May 5, 2023 at OHSU Old Library
The Oregon BIRCWH Program, OHSU Center for Women's Health, and the OHSU Department of Obstetrics and Gynecology are proud to announce the 2023 Northwest Women's Health and Sex/Gender Differences Research Conference at Oregon Health & Science University.
This full-day in-person conference is designed to ignite cross-institution, multidisciplinary research partnerships within the Portland area and the greater state of Oregon. Previous conferences have been incredibly successful in developing new partnerships that have progressed to grant proposals, funding, and research. The conference takes place during OHSU Research Week to both highlight the BIRCWH and WRHR programs and their roles within the OHSU community, but also to give greater visibility to women’s health and sex/gender differences research on the OHSU campus.
We use several innovative approaches to help investigators learn about other institutions and investigators to promote new collaborations:
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Nationally recognized keynote speakers: Igho Ofotokum, MD, PhD and Diana Greene Foster, PhD.
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Expert panelists from NW research organizations highlight current research activities and future opportunities.
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Round tables for participants and institutions to meet.
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Oral presentations by BIRCWH and WRHR Scholars and from submitted abstracts.
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Poster session for attendees to highlight current work.
We are excited to be a part of OHSU Research Week this year and are accepting abstract submissions* for oral and poster presentations at our conference through the Research Week abstract submission portal.
*When submitting an abstract for our conference, please be sure to check YES to: *Is your abstract primarily focused on women’s health, sex, and/or gender research?
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Announcements and updates
Congratulations to Dr. Jeanne-Marie Guise on her recent appointment as the Department Chair of Obstetrics, Gynecology, and Reproductive Biology at Beth Israel Deaconess Medical Center in Boston (an affiliate of Harvard Medical School)! Dr. Guise was the Principal Investigator of the Oregon BIRCWH Program from 2008 to 2022. During her tenure, she mentored and guided many BIRCWH Scholars towards successful careers and led the BIRCWH Program through two perfect score renewals. Dr. Leslie Myatt has taken over for Dr. Guise as Principal Investigator.

Welcome to Bethany Samuelson Bannow, MD, one of our new Oregon BIRCWH Scholars!
Dr. Samuelson Bannow, MD, is an Assistant Professor in the Department of Medicine, The Hemophilia Treatment Center at OHSU with a specific research and clinical focus on hemostasis and thrombosis in people who do, did or could menstruate or become pregnant.
Congratulations to BIRCWH alumnus Julia Goodman, PhD on her selection as a Fulbright-García Robles scholar to conduct research with scholars at EQUIDE Research Institute for Equitable Development at Universidad Iberoamericana in Mexico City from Oct. 1, 2022 through June 30, 2023.
Congratulations to Zhenzhen Zhang, PhD, MPH, MMed and colleagues on their abstract, “Gut Microbiome Alpha Diversity and Risk of Breast Cancer: Findings from a Case–Control Study,” published in the October issue of the Journal of Women's Health.
Congratulations to all of our recently funded graduates!
News and events
2023 BIRCWH Northwest Women's Health and Sex/Gender Differences Research Conference - Friday, May 5
BIRCWH & WRHR joint peer-to-peer meetings (virtual) - occur every other Friday from 1:00-2:30 p.m