Heidi Sato

Dr. Heidi Sato received a Bachelor of Science in Nutrition and Food Science from the University of California, Berkeley, a Master of Public Health from Columbia University, and a Ph.D. From Touro University. She received an award from the American Public Health Association for her dissertation research focused on developing a structural equation model to predict foodborne illness outbreaks at restaurants. She has worked for 15 years as an epidemiologist for Los Angeles County Department of Health Services. While working for the Acute Communicable Disease Control Unit, she investigated over 60 outbreaks of infectious diseases. She has also conducted epidemiologic analysis of restaurant inspections and provided consultation to senior management at Los Angeles County Department of Health Services. She received an award for her development of Foodborne Illness Advisor, a database application which advises inspectors regarding foodborne illness complaints. She has served as an expert witness for the largest hepatitis A outbreak in the US. Dr. Sato has been a faculty member for over 15 years, and has also served as the Chair of the Institutional Review Board, Co-Director of the MSHS Program, and Director of Institutional Research. She has also conducted research at the World Health Organization and worked on a medical project in Ghana, West Africa. She is interested in opportunities that offer challenge and innovation, specifically innovative research and/or applications for preventing disease.Specialties: Infectious diseases, epidemiology, outbreak investigation, bioterrorism, global health, emergency and disaster management, logistic regression analysis, structural equation modeling, database applications