Founding Chair

Dr. McKee is a family physician with clinical and research expertise in disability health. As a Deaf physician, he is especially interested in advocating for the rights of Deaf and hard of hearing patients to obtain equitable health care including accessible communication. His research focus includes health disparities for individuals with various disabilities, health information accessibility, health literacy, and telemedicine applications. Dr. McKee is on the board of the Association of Medical Professionals with Hearing Losses (AMPHL). He is also currently an appointed member of the Roundtable on Health Literacy of the National Academy of Sciences, Engineering, and Medicine.

Co-Chair

Hilary Brown, PhD, is an Assistant Professor at the University of Toronto, in the Department of Health & Society and the Dalla Lana School of Public Health. She is also an Adjunct Scientist at Women’s College Hospital and ICES. Dr. Brown holds a Tier 2 Canada Research Chair in Disability & Reproductive Health. Her research program uses epidemiologic methods to examine maternal and child health and mental health across the life course, with a particular focus on populations with disabilities and chronic illness, health equity, and the social determinants of health.

Early Career Professional Chair

Dr. Agarwal is a Simmons+Hernandez Suarez Postdoctoral Fellow at FIU Embrace, a center at Florida International University that promotes health, wellness, and overall functioning for young adults with developmental disabilities. Her research focuses on the parents who support these young adults through periods of transition. She also studies how best to enhance the inclusion of these young adults in our organizations and communities. Dr. Agarwal was a Founding Member for the Leaders in Maternal and Child Health, a student-led organization at the university; is frequently invited as a guest lecturer to cover disability related issues; and is a peer-reviewer for many disability journals.

Student Chair

Elian Sorensen is the Student Chair for the Disability Section Mentoring Program. He is a research associate for the disability consulting non-profit World Enabled and this fall, he is part of the American Association of People with Disabilities Fall Internship Program, where he is interning at the Administration for Community Living. He graduated last May from Hamilton College, where he studied Public Policy and completed a senior thesis on the potential for disability theory to inform alternatives to nursing home care for elders and adults with disabiliites. While at Hamilton, he founded and served as President of Hamilton College’s first Disabled Students’ Network (DSN). 

Dr. Nary is a former Co-Chair for the Disability Section Mentoring Program. She is a retired assistant research professor at the Research and Training Center on Independent Living at the University of Kansas.  Her research interests focus on community participation, health promotion, and advocacy training for people with disabilities; and on creating accessible communities for all.  She has been active in leadership of the Disability Section of the American Public Health Association; served as the founding staff advisor for AbleHawks and Allies, the student group dedicated to raising disability awareness and increasing access at KU; and the KU Faculty and Staff Council on Disability Inclusion. 

Meredith is a co-founder and former Student Chair for the Disability Section Mentoring Program. She is a PhD candidate in public health with a passion for promoting disability inclusion and mobilizing public health knowledge, frameworks, and strategies to meet the needs of the disability community. She has a background in patient and disability advocacy, firmly grounded in her own lived experience, and professional experience consulting, teaching, developing programs and trainings, conducting research, and providing technical assistance.

Christina Kim is a recent MPH graduate of Downstate School of Public Health and is the APHA Disability Section’s Student Liaison. She is passionate about reducing health disparities for people with disabilities and creating inclusive opportunities for students and early career professionals. Her research experience includes adaptive design solutions for people with spina bifida and epidemiologic data analyses.

Dr. Vijay Vasudevan is a Data Scientist whose work is to promote health and wellness at the nexus of public health, advocacy, and community implementation. He received his PhD in Disability Studies from the University of Illinois at Chicago and his MPH from the University of Florida. He is the current Chair-Elect of the Disability Section of the American Public Health Association and has been involved the Section’s leadership since 2010.

Meg Ann Traci, PhD serves as Past Chair of the APHA Disability Section and is a Research Associate Professor at the University of Montana. Dr. Traci had the opportunity to train as a developmental psychologist at the time when public health began to shift its frameworks to improve health and participation with people with disability. As a result of these opportunities, Dr. Traci has nearly thirty years of experience working with the disability community to support this paradigm shift within public health and to coproduce actionable solutions with the disability community to advance social justice and health equity.