Ruth Elaine Zielinski is a Clinical Professor in the Department of Health Behavior and Biological Sciences at the University of Michigan. She received her MS in Nursing (Midwifery Track) in 1995 and earned her Ph.D. in Nursing and Graduate Certificate in Women’s Studies from the University of Michigan in 2009. She is the faculty and program lead for the Midwifery Graduate Program. She is also a member of the American College of Nurse Midwives, the American Nurses Association, the Michigan Nurses Association, and the Sigma Theta Tau – Rho Chapter. Her research expertise is in women’s health around body image and sexuality and maternal health outcomes both regionally and globally. In addition, she has over 25 years of experience as a nurse-midwife and continues to practice, most recently in global settings. She has developed a program of research related to body image and sexual health focusing on the intersecting our understanding of pelvic floor muscle changes associated with childbirth and aging and the social stigma of body image.
Samia Abdelnabi is a Research Fellow in the National Clinician Scholars Program at the Department of Health Behavior and Biological Sciences, University of Michigan School of Nursing. She received her BSN and MSN from Wayne State University in 2007 and 2009, respectively, obtained her Post-Master’s Certificate Nursing from South University in 2015, and earned a Ph.D. from Wayne State University in 2022. She also serves as a Member of the American College of Nurse Midwives, a Member and Vice President of the Michigan Affiliate of the American College of Nurse Midwives, a Member of the American Academy of Nurse Practitioners, and a Member of the Michigan Nurses Association. Her research focuses on improving psychosocial well-being in Muslim women experiencing infertility. Her future directions include creating and developing interventional programs using Traditional Arabic and Islamic Medicine (TAIM) to promote or enhance psychosocial well-being in Muslim American women with infertility. She is also interested in developing programs to promote reproductive and sexual health education in racial, ethnic, and marginalized groups.
Prof. Cheryl Moyer obtained her BA in Journalism and her MPH in from the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill in 1992 and 1995, respectively, and her PhD in Public Health from the University of Michigan in 2012. She is currently an Associate Professor of Learning Health Sciences, Associate Professor of Obstetrics and Gynecology, and Associate Chair for Diversity, Equity, and Inclusion at the University of Michigan Medical School. Her research focuses on the social and cultural factors that influence maternal and neonatal health outcomes in sub-Saharan Africa, including an emphasis on facility-based delivery, neonatal mortality, social autopsy, and the assessment of ‘near-miss mortality’—or those mothers and babies who suffer a life-threatening complication but ultimately survive. Most recently, she was the lead investigator on a 3-year USAID-funded project in northern Ghana that involved the conduct of social autopsies to explore maternal and neonatal deaths, and sociocultural audits to explore the determinants of maternal and neonatal near-misses. She also serves as a co-investigator on an NIH-funded global health training grant for U.S. and Ghanaian post-doctoral fellows.
Prof. Jody R Lori obtained her BSN and MS from the University of Michigan in 1980 and 1992, respectively, and her PhD from the University of Arizona in 2009. She is currently a Sara H. & Robert B. Rothschild Endowed Professor in Global Nursing and Associate Dean for Global Affairs in the Department of Health Behavior and Biological Sciences at the University of Michigan School of Nursing. Dr. Lori’s program of research contributes to the design and testing of innovative models of care to improve maternal and newborn health in areas of the world challenged by a lack of human resources, long distances to care, and cultural, gender, and socio-economic barriers. Her research has contributed to the development of models of care to reduce the burden of maternal and newborn mortality on individuals, their families, and society through a program of participatory action research in low-resource countries. She also serves as Director of the Pan-American Health Organization (PAHO)/World Health Organization (WHO) Collaborating Center for Nursing and Midwifery at UMSN.
