Biography
During her studies, Dr. Andress secured a Master of Public Health and Ph.D. in Community Health Science (University of Texas Health Sciences Center, major in health policy; concentration in Management and Policy Sciences), and a law degree from South Texas College of Law, Houston, Texas. Connected to broader interests in the achievement of equity through structural and policy change, predicated on the social determinants of health (SDOH) and community engagement, Dr. Andress’ career has provided equity-oriented leadership, scholarship, and instruction in public health settings, community-driven initiatives, schools of medicine, and government and political settings. An important guiding vision for Dr. Andress is to shift the way that society thinks about and conceptualizes notions of good and poor health, making room for the prioritization of equity, mutual respect, and social justice.
Dr. Andress' early career was spent working in public health governance and political settings. She led teams that launched the Centers for Health Equity in Wisconsin and Louisville, Kentucky. Through her experiences, she developed skills in strategic communication serving as Public Information Officer and Chief of Public Affairs in Houston’s Department of Health and Human Services. Later she assumed the position of Policy aide and Communications Officer in Washington D. C. for the 18th Congressional District of Texas. While completing her doctorate Dr. Andress worked for one of the leading U.S. experts on population health, Dr. Alvin Tarlov, at the Texas Program for Society and Health at the Baker Institute for Public Policy, Rice University. As the Director of Operations & Strategic Political Action, her work focused on research, policy advocacy, and message framing around the social determinants of health with an emphasis on health equity from an international perspective- largely the United Kingdom and Canada.
Dr. Andress’ academic career was shaped by experiences in West Virginia within the School of Public Health at West Virginia University (WVU) where she served as the Assistant Dean for Public Health Practice and Workforce Development and a tenure track Assistant Professor in the Department of Health Policy, Management and Leadership. A major outcome of her time at WVU was research that grappled with how we measure the population health of underrepresented (UR), marginalized, and oppressed groups. Today her scholarship illustrates a qualitative public health assessment on the connection between place and health, portraying the lived experiences of UR groups as told by and through their stories, photos, narratives, and video recordings. This has resulted in a website on the intersection of place and health examining infant mortality disparities and inequities in food security, transportation, and the built environment at https://placeandhealthwv.com
More recently, before joining COPH at University of New Mexico Dr. Andress served as Associate Dean for Inclusion, Diversity, and Community Engagement and Associate Professor in the Department of Medical Education at Geisinger Commonwealth School of Medicine (GCSOM), She also took a sabbatical during which she studied community-engaged research and harm reduction advocates and assisted groups in Alabama in linking legal services to structural and institutional issues that contravene better population health.
Areas of Specialty
Equity, Inclusion, Community Engagement
Equity-related website: http://bridgingthehealthgap.com/index.html
Health & Place Website: https://placeandhealthwv.com
Education
2007 - Ph.D, Management and Policy Sciences, University of Texas Health Science Center, School of Public Health, Houston, TX. Dissertation: The Emergence of the Social Determinants of Health on the Policy Agenda in Britain: A Case Study, 1980–2003.
http://digitalcommons.library.tmc.edu/dissertations/AAI3258575
1997 - Juris Doctor, South Texas College of Law, Houston, TX.
1985 - Master of Public Health, University of Texas Health Science Center, School of Public Health, Houston, TX. Concentration: Health Services Organization. Thesis: Health Promotion Programs in Galveston County.
1983 - Bachelor of Science, Biology, Bethune-Cookman College, Daytona Beach, Florida.
Undergrad: Bethune-Cookman College, Daytona Beach, FL
Graduate: University of Texas Health Science Center, School of Public Health, Houston, TX
Doctoral: South Texas College of Law, Houston, TX
Post Graduate: University of Texas Health Science Center, School of Public Health, Houston, TX
Achievements & Awards
Physicians & Surgeons (Marshall Health), Marshall School of Medicine (PI)
03/19/21– Ongoing ($84,673.00)
Medical Schools Dismantling Discrimination, Racism and Stigma Through Structural Competency (DDRS): This project launches the first structural competency training in West Virginia with the goal of addressing structural factors that support systemic racism and discrimination starting with first-year medical students. The project aims to intervene at the level where medical students are trained to challenge beliefs that doctors are neutral observers of science, above politics, and incapable of biases. In this way, we can mediate the formation of knowledge, values, practices, and shared understandings that determine how physicians will work in marginalized communities and move about in the world in the future.
Walmart Foundation (Co-I)
01/12/20-Ongoing ($614,000)
Qualitative evaluation of an initiative to coordinate a distribution network to provide fresh produce, basic equipment, and non-perishables to 10 West Virginia food desert communities.
Natural Resource Analysis Center, Davis College Cooperative Agreement; USDA (Co-PI)
01/16/2018– Ongoing ($ 1,125,000.00)
Food Deserts in West Virginia examines the meaning of food deserts in West Virginia based on a communications framing analysis and proposing structural, systemic, and policy solutions.
Responsibilities include managing one doctoral student and implementing two food desert statewide meetings.
Physicians & Surgeons (Marshall Health), Marshall School of Medicine (PI)
07/01/19– Ongoing ($26,000)
Birth Equity Committee: This project implements a pilot project in West Virginia to create and launch an exploratory committee that will devise a data-driven set of public health strategies to reduce inequities in birth outcomes in West Virginia.
City of Morgantown (PI)
07/01/2018–Ongoing ($12,184.00)
Building civic capacity around health, safety and transportation by implementing equitable strategies around creative place-making. The purpose of this award is to implement a pilot project in Morgantown to build a toolkit using the principles of equity, civic engagement, and
creative placemaking that bridges the transportation planning and operations gap between vulnerable populations and transportation planning agencies.
United States Department of Agriculture Rural Utilities Service, Appalachian Community Technical Assistance and Training (ACTAT) Program, National Drinking Water Clearinghouse Project; Award 1007238R, Project 10021177 (Co-PI)
09/01/2016–12/30/20 ($466,478.00)
The project advanced a new model for the role of universities and state extension offices in advancing the economic development of small communities through the construction and maintenance of essential services in drinking water and wastewater that also protects and enhances the health of communities. I provide leadership and technical information to small communities to
develop capabilities to manage their utility infrastructure services to maintain compliance with regulations and provide essential services to residents. .
North Carolina State University (Co-PI)
11/01/18–08/31/2019
Food security across five rural states for families with children, this award was part of a multistate contract with Feeding America and Save Our Children that includes advising on study design, recruitment strategies, data collection and analysis methods for the study. The data collection involves securing 50 qualitative, in-depth, in-person interviews with low-income rural caretakers of households with children in Texas and West Virginia; participation in regularly scheduled conference calls and meetings, and contributing to related peer-reviewed papers, presentations, and policy briefs.
HRSA Region III Public Health Training Center 0044318 (125309-4) (PI)
09/01/2014–05/31/2016
Building infrastructure for public health workforce development in West Virginia.
Claude Worthington Benedum Foundation (PI)
06/01/2015–05/15/2016
Implemented models of care using Emergency Medical Services (EMS) resources to reduce re-hospitalizations of transitional care patients by directing these nontraditional local resources to meet with the highest-risk patients in their homes to assess progress.
WVU Community Engagement Award; Food Access and Seniors Taking Care of Grand Kids (PI)
07/01/2016–07/01/2017
Researched the connections between place and behavior. Collecting qualitative data on how seniors in a rural county in West Virginia access food given the extra burden of caring for grandchildren. Policies, systems, and regulations that support or act as barriers to the efforts of seniors to feed themselves and their grandchildren are also examined.
Carolyn Haase Trust (PI)
04/01/2015–10/15/2016
A photovoice project with seniors in Preston County West Virginia conducted an assessment of issues related to food access for the elderly in a rural county. The photos were a less abstract, more distinct depiction of a policy problem and potential solutions as expressed by the participants.
Photovoice typically explores the idea of community issues represented by the people and the spaces that they inhabit.
Claude Worthington Benedum Foundation (Co-PI)
10/01/2014–09/30/2015
Establishing quality measures and a system of support for community health workers in West Virginia; the goal of this study was to record and determine the best practices for building a statewide system to support community health workers in West Virginia.
Start Up-Funds (PI)
07/22/2013–11/15/2017
Transforming Communities Through the Built Environment to Advance Health and Health Equity: A Case Study of Two Communities. Considered how the built environment works across three low-
income, urban communities from the perspective of residents and experts in public health and community development.
Key Publications
Byker Shanks, C., Parks, C., Izumi, B., Andress, L., & Yaroch, A.L. The need to incorporate diversity, equity, and inclusion: Reflections from a national initiative measuring fruit and vegetable intake. Journal of the Academy of Nutrition and Dietetics. Published online January 21, 2022. In Press. https://www.jandonline.org/article/S2212-2672(22)00042-9/pdf
Grocke-Dewey, M., Hardison-Moody, A., Haynes-Maslow, L., Maras, S., Webber, E., Andress, L., ... & Byker-Shanks, C. (2021). Examining the relationship between physical activity and mental health during the COVID-19 pandemic across five US States. Preventive Medicine Reports, 24, 101537. https://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/S2211335521002278
Andress L, Byker Shanks C, Hardison-Moody A, Prewitt TE, Kinder P, Haynes-Maslow L. The curated food
system: A limiting aspirational vision of what constitutes “good” food. International Journal of Environmental Research and Public Health. 2020;17(17):6157. https://www.mdpi.com/1660- 4601/17/17/6157.pdf
Andress L, Hall T, Davis S, Levine J, Cripps K, Guinn D. Addressing power dynamics in community- engaged research partnerships. Journal of Patient-Reported Outcomes. 2020; 4:1–8. https://link.springer.com/content/pdf/10.1186/s41687-020-00191-z.pdf
Lindsey Haynes-Maslow , Annie Hardison-Moody, Megan Patton-Lopez, T. Elaine Prewitt, Carmen Byker Shanks, Lauri Andress, Isabel Osborne, Stephanie Jilcott Pitts. International Journal of Environmental
Research and Public Health. Examining Rural Food Insecure Families' Perceptions of the Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program: A Qualitative Study. 2020 17 (17): 6390
https://www.mdpi.com/1660-4601/17/17/6390
Mohamed Shabani Kariburyo , Lauri Andress, Alan R. Collins, Paul Kinder. Place Effects and Chronic Disease Rates in a Rural State: Evidence from a Triangulation of Methods. International Journal of Environmental Research and Public Health. 2020;17(18):6676.
https://www.mdpi.com/1660-4601/17/18/6676.pdf
Andress L, Purtill MP. Shifting the gaze of the physician from the body to the body in a place: A qualitative analysis of a community-based photovoice approach to teaching place-health concepts to medical students. PLoS One. 2020;15(2):e0228640. https://journals.plos.org/plosone/article?id=10.1371/journal.pone.0228640
Andress L, Urhie O, Compton C. West Virginia’s sugary drink tax: Examining print media frames in local news sources. Journal of Appalachian Health. 2019;1(2):19. https://uknowledge.uky.edu/cgi/viewcontent.cgi?article=1005&context=jah
Haynes-Maslow L, Osborne I, Jilcott Pitts S, et al. Rural corner store owners’ perceptions of stocking healthier foods in response to proposed SNAP retailer rule changes. Food Policy. 2018;81:58–66. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.foodpol.2018.10.004
Andress L, Scalise D, Wright JG, Moore SE. Fitting a square peg into a round hole: Perceptions of Appalachian physicians on the incorporation of chronic disease prevention into their practice. Preventive Medicine Reports. 2018;11:216–20. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.pmedr.2018.06.002
Haynes-Maslow L, Andress L, Jilcott Pitts S, Prewitt E, Sequin RA, Ammerman AS. Arguments used in public comments to support or oppose the US Department of Agriculture’s minimum stocking requirements: A content analysis. Journal of the Academy of Nutrition and Dietetics. 2018;118(9):1664– 72. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.jand.2017.12.005
Andress L. Forgetting health disparities: A one size fits all narrative. Cogent Social Sciences [online]. 2017;3(1) Article 1279761. http://www.tandfonline.com/doi/full/10.1080/23311886.2017.1279761
Research
• Social Determinants of Health
• Health Equity
• Health and Place
• Public Policy Process
• Food Systems
• Social Movements and Agenda Setting
• Community Civic Capacity
• Post Modern Theories on Policymaking
• Issue Analysis and Policy Framing
• Social/Health Impact Assessments
• Built Environment
• Population Health
Courses Taught
West Virginia University 2013 to present; 150 students
Policy Tools for Population Health, HPML 624, graduate Graduate Seminar HPML 696
Issue Analysis for the Social Determinants of Health (Food Systems), HPML 624, graduate Ethical Leadership in Public Health, HPML 683, graduate
Social Determinants of Health, PUBH 202, undergraduate
Ethical, Legal, and Financial Issues in Healthcare, PUBH 464, undergraduate
Texas Southern University 2005 to 2012; 75 students
Program Evaluation, PA 400, undergraduate
Organization, Management and Behavior, PA 313, undergraduate American Political Systems I and II, Sections 231 & 232, undergraduate Research Methods, PA 502, graduate
Science, Technology and Public Policy, PA 622, graduate Public Policy Analytical Methods, PA 623, graduate Health and the Built Environment, UPEP 873, graduate
Public Personnel Administration, PA 321, graduate
The Policy Process, PA 401, undergraduate
University of Houston Clear Lake 2005 to 2006 50 students
Legal Dimensions of Healthcare Administration, HADM 4332, undergraduate
Health Care Law and Ethics, HCMG 7320, graduate
Our Lady of the Lake 2003 45 students
Policy, Values and Partnerships, LEAD 9330, graduate