Dr. Karla Hanson began her career in public health as director of planning and development at a federally qualified primary care health center. This experience led her to pursue graduate school in health policy at the Wagner School of Public Service at NYU, where she researched policies and trends regarding health insurance and access to health care for children and caregivers, particularly those from low-income households in the U.S.

Before joining the Master of Public Health (MPH) program faculty in 2019, Dr. Hanson was in the Division of Nutritional Sciences at Cornell, the Department of Public Health and Preventive Medicine at Oregon Health & Science University, and the Milano School of Policy and Management at The New School in New York City.

“Over time, it became clear to me that upstream factors like access to healthy food were foundational to health and well-being and that health care is often tasked with ameliorating the symptoms of these social conditions,” says Hanson. Thus, her work shifted to focus primarily on access to healthy food, including school meals, farmers’ markets, community supported agriculture, home and community gardening, civic engagement, and systems of mutual aid. Many students contribute to this work as research assistants and through applied coursework. “It is exciting to see them experience first-hand the many layers of the food system and how it influences health,” she says.

This semester, Dr. Hanson will have the opportunity to bring together her interest in food access and her experience within the health care system to a new project funded by the Einhorn Center for Community Engagement and the Cornell Center for Health Equity. For this project, Dr. Hanson along MPH visiting lecturer, Lara Parrilla, will strengthen collaborations between health care, community organizations, and public health to address the social determinants of health and increase health equity.

Leadership from three local organizations – Cayuga Health Partners, Visiting Nurse Services, and Foodnet Meals on Wheels – are partnering in this research to identify ways to enhance organizational collaboration to improve processes, share information, and improve health outcomes. Undergraduate and MPH students are using qualitative data collection and analysis techniques to provide information to the community partners, and then will interpret the data collaboratively and develop recommendations.

Written by Zoe Wakoff and Katie Lesser