KAY TESCHKE

Professor, School of Public and Population Health, and School of Environmental Health

Dr. Teschke joined the UBC Department of Health Care and Epidemiology in 1984. She was part of the team that developed the Occupational Hygiene Program, the first graduate program for this profession in Western Canada. It admitted its first students in 1992 and became a professional school, now the School of Environmental Health, in 1999 under her directorship. She was principal investigator and inaugural director of the Bridge Program from 2002 to 2008. This fellowship-funding program brings together excellent graduate students, post-docs and practitioners from 8 academic units and 3 faculties at UBC to study public health issues, with a focus on prevention measures related to engineering and policy.

Dr. Teschke's area of research interest is exposure assessment, with a particular emphasis on improving exposure-response relationships in epidemiology and empirical modeling of factors that influence exposures. The issues addressed by her research span both environmental and occupational health, and currently include: ycling in cities: Impact of transportation infrastructure on ridership and injuries; Langley water & health study: Impact of water quality risk factors on endemic gastrointestinal illnes; Parkinson's disease: occupational risk factors and genetic susceptibilit; back injuries in heavy industries; forestry, wood products, transportation, warehousing, construction; public opinions about participating in health research; and Population Data BC: Linking exposure data to health care services data.