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.
Wednesday, May 8, 2024, at OHSU Auditorium and Old Library
Conference registration is now open!
The Oregon BIRCWH Program, OHSU Center for Women's Health, and the OHSU Department of Obstetrics and Gynecology are proud to announce the 2024 Northwest Women's Health and Sex/Gender Differences Research Conference at Oregon Health & Science University.
This year's theme is: The power of collaborative research in women’s health and sex/gender differences.
This full-day in-person conference is designed to ignite cross-institution, multidisciplinary research partnerships and collaborations 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 are thrilled to have Susan D. Reed, MD, MPH, MS, joining us as keynote speaker. Dr. Reed is Professor Emeritus and past Vice Chair for Research in the department of Obstetrics and Gynecology, with an adjunct appointment in Epidemiology at the University of Washington School of Medicine. She is immediate past president of The Menopause Society.
Keynote: Advancing Women’s Health Through Menopause Research
Dr. Reed will review why menopause research matters and describe current NIH funding for women’s health research. She will discuss key findings from prior NIH funded menopausal studies and present ideas about future directions for women’s health research that links the premenopausal and perimenopausal experience to healthy aging.
Follow us on X! @OregonBIRCWH
Announcements and updates
The application process for the Oregon BIRCWH Program is open for 2024. We are currently accepting applications for a two-year appointment beginning August 1, 2024, or October 1, 2024. The deadline to apply is May 1, 2024. Please see RFP for more details.
Congratulations to Dr. Zhenzhen Zhang on the selection of her BIRCWH funded project paper “Association between Gut Microbiota and Breast Cancer: Diet as a Potential Modulating Factor” published in Nutrients as the School of Medicine’s Paper of the Month. The study was led by a team including first author Duygu Altinok Dindar, MD, PhD, postdoctoral scholar, CEDAR, and senior author Zhenzhen Zhang, PhD, MPH, MMed, assistant professor, Division of Oncological Sciences, OHSU School of Medicine, and member of the Knight Cancer Institute.
Learn more about Dr. Zhang's paper on key findings about the gut microbiome, lifestyle factors, and breast cancer risk.
Congratulations to Dr. Quin Denfeld, recipient of the Marie Cowan Promising Early Career Investigator Award by the American Heart Association’s Council on Cardiovascular and Stroke Nursing. The award is given to a junior investigator (5-10 years post-terminal degree) each year who demonstrates the scientific excellence and spirit of innovation exemplified by Dr. Marie Cowan’s work.
Dr. Denfeld received the award at the organization’s 2023 Scientific Sessions. She submitted her publication on candidate biomarkers of physical frailty in heart failure (funded by the BIRCWH) that was published in the February 2023 issue of the European Journal of Cardiovascular Nursing. Co-authors include BIRCWH alum Dr. Christopher Lee and current BIRCWH Scholar Dr. Mary Roberts Davis.
You can access the paper here and learn about Dr. Denfeld's lab here. Read more about this award on OHSU Now.
Events
2024 Northwest Women's Health and Sex/Gender Differences Research Conference, May 8, 2024 @ OHSU Auditorium
BIRCWH & WRHR joint peer-to-peer meetings (virtual) - occur every other Friday from 1:00-2:30 p.m.