Shelley M. Brown, PhD, MPH

Background

Shelley Brown, PhD, MPH is a Clinical Assistant Professor in the Department of Health Sciences. Dr. Brown’s research focuses on the key linkages between health, human development and human rights, especially women’s mental health during the perinatal period. She is currently involved in a number of research projects in the United States and South Africa. Shelley’s research is deeply interdisciplinary and engages the larger themes of health equity, global health, health systems and women’s health, utilizing both health systems information and qualitative research to inform proposed changes in policy and clinical practice. Research projects include the implementation and promotion of perinatal mental health policies in practice, health system responses to intimate partner violence in South Africa; translation of evidence-based policy into practice in low and middle income countries; unmet mental health and social service needs of formerly incarcerated women living with HIV in the Deep South; and the legal obligation in South African to provide human-rights based mental health services in the perinatal period. She is the inaugural director of Sargent’s Service Learning Program, serving in that capacity since 2017.

Courses Taught

Selected Publications

• Brown S., Sprague C., & Lindsay, A.L. (2022). Understanding Perinatal Mental Health as a Global Health Governance Concern in South Africa: Health Provider Perspectives. Global Public Health 17:12, 3519-3532.
• Brown S, Sprague C. Health care providers’ perceptions of barriers to perinatal mental healthcare in South Africa. BMC Public Health. 2021;21(1):1905. doi:10.1186/s12889-021-11954-8.
• Sprague C, Brown S.M., Simon SE, McMahan LD, & Konkle-Parker D. (2020). Experience of religion and spirituality among socially marginalised people living with HIV in Mississippi. Culture, Health and Sexuality:1-15. doi:10.1080/13691058.2020.1758345.
• Brown S, MacNaughton G, & Sprague C. (2020). A Right-to-Health Lens on Perinatal Mental Health Care in South Africa. Health and Human Rights;22(2):125-138.
• Sprague C, Brown S.M., Simon S, McMahan LD, Kassiel I, & Konkle-Parker D. (2020). Towards ending the US HIV epidemic by 2030: Understanding social determinants of health and HIV in Mississippi. Global Public Health;15(1):31-51. doi:10.1080/17441692.2019.1631366.
• Pantalone, D. W., Scanlon, M. L., Brown, S. M., Radhakrishnan, B., & Sprague, C. (2018). Unmet Mental Health and Social Service Needs of Formerly Incarcerated Women Living with HIV in the Deep South. Journal of the Association of Nurses in AIDS Care, 29(5), 712-727. doi:10.1016/j.jana.2018.04.003
• Sprague, C., Radhakrishnan, B., Brown, S. M., Sommers, T., & Pantalone, D. W. (2017). Southern Women at Risk: Narratives of Familial and Social HIV Risk in Justice-Involved U.S. Women in Alabama. Violence & Victims, 32(4), 728-753. doi:10.1891/0886-6708.VV-D-16-00077
• Sprague, C., & Brown, S. M. (2017). Local and Global HIV Aging Demographics and Research. In R. F. DeMarco, & M. Brennan-Ing (Eds.), Interdisciplinary Topics in Gerontology and Geriatrics (pp. 1-10). New York, NY and Boston, MA: Karger. doi:10.1159/000448532
• DeMarco, R. F., Brennan-Ing, M., Sprague, C., & Brown, S. M. (2017). Ageism, Aging and HIV: Community Responses to Prevention, Treatment, Care and Support. Interdisciplinary Topics in Gerontology and Geriatrics. In R. F. DeMarco, & M. Brennan-Ing (Eds.), Interdisciplinary Topics in Gerontology and Geriatrics (Vol. 42, pp. 234-239). New York: Karger. doi:10.1159/000448567
• Sprague, C., Woollett, N., Parpart, J., Hatcher, A. M., Sommers, T., Brown, S., & Black, V. (2015). When nurses are also patients: Intimate partner violence and the health system as an enabler of women’s health and agency in Johannesburg Global Public Health, 0(0), 1–15.
• Brown, S.M., Monahan, A, Daniels, J.E. (2013) Type-2 diabetes in Belize: A cross-sectional study and holistic approach to increasing health education: Building Community Capacity: Case Examples from Around the World. Hauppauge, NY: Nova Science Publishers.

Selected Presentations

• International Marce Society, Perinatal mood and anxiety disorders in low and middle-income countries: Gaps between policy and practice (poster), 2022, London, England
• American Public Health Association Annual Conference, Early identification of perinatal mood and anxiety disorders in low and middle-income countries, 2021, Denver, CO
• International Marce Society, Perinatal Mental Health Provider Training and Education in LMICs: Lessons from South Africa, 2020, Iowa City, IA.
• American Public Health Association Annual Conference, Perinatal Mental Health and Rights-based Policy Approaches, 2019, Philadelphia, PA
• Eastern Sociological Society, Mini-Conference in Global Health, The politics of neglect and implications for the global health discourse: perinatal mental health in South Africa, 2018.
• Academic and Health Policy Conference on Correctional Health, A Life Course Approach to Mental Health and Post-Release Adjustment in Southern Women with HIV, 2015
• Panelist, 50 Years Later: A Discussion on Voting Rights and Mass Incarceration in 2015
• University of Massachusetts Boston, College of Nursing and Health Sciences Research and Scholarship Day, Poster Presentation: When Nurses are Also Patients, 2014
• Brown, S.M., Monahan, A, Daniels, J.E. (2012) Type-2 diabetes in Belize: A cross-sectional study and holistic approach to increasing health education. American Public Health Association 140th Annual Meeting and Exposition, San Francisco, CA (Accepted)
• Onyeachom, U.N., Njepuome, N, Brown, S. (2011) Electronic data capture in a resource constrained environment : A case study of Abuja Heart Study. American Public Health Association 139th Annual Meeting and Exposition, Washington, D.C.
• Brown, S. (2011) Partnering with the Community: Assessing the Impact on Undergraduate Health Practicum on Community Health. Community Campus Partnerships for Health CU Expo, Waterloo, Canada.

Professional Activities and Awards

• Sargent College Representative, Sargent Faculty Council, 2019-current
• BU Pardee Center, Faculty Research Fellow, 2019-2021
• BU Center for Teaching and Learning STEM Faculty Fellow, 2019-2020
• International Marce Society, Member, 2019-present
• 2020 Mom, Influencer Advisory Board member, 2019-present
• Clinical Assistant Professor Faculty Search Committee, Chair, 2020
• Tenure Track – Assistant Professor Faculty Search Committee, Member, 2018
• UMass Boston Center for Peace, Democracy and Development, Fellow, 2016-present
• Fellow at the Center for Peace, Democracy and Development at the University of Massachusetts Boston, 2016-present
• Sargent International Service Learning, Director, 2014-Present
• American Public Health Association (APHA), Member 2014-present