The purpose of the Center for Health and Social Issues at Georgia College & State University is to improve the health of the residents of Central Georgia through collaborative campus/community partnerships to provide research and education concerning contemporary health problems and social issues.
Strategic Plan
The Center for Health and Social Issues believes that good health is a multidimensional phenomenon comprised of a balance of physical, psychological, social, and spiritual dimensions. Good health is essential to the attainment of an actualized life. Individuals have the power to positively change their own health status and to influence others to do the same, as well as the power to positively influence the health of the community and nation. Research is essential to our understanding of health and social issues related to health. As an institution of higher learning, GC has an obligation to direct its many resources for the purpose of improving both individual and public health.
Director
Center for Health & Social Issues
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Damian K. Francis
Assistant Professor - Public Health and Director - Center for Health and Social Issues
Ph.D., Epidemiology, University of the West Indies
Biography
Dr. Damian K. Francis is a Nutritionist and Epidemiologist coming from the Caribbean Institute for Health Research, University of the West Indies, Jamaica. He is a 2010 Emerging Leader of the Americas Programme (ELAP) scholar, awarded by the Canadian Bureau of International Education. As an ELAP scholar, he completed a research fellowship at the University of Ottawa in knowledge synthesis and knowledge translation. Dr. Francis is founder of the Cochrane Caribbean and currently serves as Co-Director. He serves both the Pan American Health Organization and World Health Organization (WHO) as a member of the Essential Medicine List expert panel. Dr. Francis enjoys teaching translational research and does this in his role as faculty at the WHO/Cochrane/Cornell Summer Institute for systematic reviews in nutrition for global policymaking. Dr. Francis has a track record of excellence in research scholarship which has focused on the epidemiology of chronic non-communicable diseases among people of Afro-Caribbean heritage with an emphasis on health equity/disparities and public health nutrition.
