Kathleen Duffany, PhD, MEd

Kathleen O’Connor Duffany, PhD, is Assistant Professor of Clinical Public Health in the Social and Behavioral Sciences Department at the Yale School of Public Health, Director of Research and Evaluation for CARE (the Community Alliance for Research and Engagement), and Co-Director of the Yale-Griffin Prevention Research Center. Dr. O’Connor Duffany’s research examines the social, biological, behavioral, and structural barriers to health equity. Over the past two decades, her work included extensive interactions with schools and community-based organizations to improve health and education outcomes. From large scale multi-national projects, to local community-based programs, she has designed and collaborated on research studies and evaluations assessing and addressing social determinants of health with an interest in long-term structural and policy change. She works collaboratively with community partners to identify ways to improve health in the community at large and communicate findings in multiple formats to reach academicians, community residents, and policy makers – conducting ‘rigorous community research for practical benefit’.

Dr. O’Connor Duffany was one of the lead developers and co-director of the Community Interventions in Health (CIH) study, the multinational study on chronic disease prevention, from which CARE’s research in schools and neighborhoods evolved. She was responsible for grant development across sites (India, China, Mexico), survey and protocol development, operations, implementation, and evaluation. Locally, she serves on committees related to New Haven’s health assessments, community partnerships, and food insecurity in Greater New Haven. Additionally, Dr. O’Connor Duffany is co-lead of C3E (CARE Center for Community Evaluation), an evaluation center designed to meet assessment and evaluation needs of agencies in Greater New Haven.