JOHNSON CITY— Michael Meit, director of research and programs at the East Tennessee State University Center for Rural Health Research, will be featured on a national podcast focusing on rural public health.

The podcast is hosted by Dr. Alfredo Morabia, editor-in-chief of the American Journal of Public Health (AJPH). It will be available beginning Aug. 5 at ajph.aphapublications.org.

“In this podcast, we discussed the implications of framing rural America as ‘older, poorer, sicker’ and ways that we could instead leverage rural strengths and assets to improve rural health and well-being,” Meit said. “The podcast will support an upcoming issue of AJPH on rural public health, where ETSU is front and center.”

The rural public health issue of AJPH will include an editorial authored by Meit and one authored by Dr. Randy Wykoff, dean of ETSU’s College of Public Health.

In addition, Meit co-authored two articles in the upcoming issue, including one investigating differences in funding and service delivery between rural and urban local health departments in the United States. This article was co-authored by Meit; Drs. Kate Beatty and Nathan Hale, associate professors in ETSU’s College of Public Health; and Megan Heffernan, a research scientist at NORC at the University of Chicago.

The upcoming podcast also features Dr. Eduardo Sanchez from the American Heart Association, Dr. Wendy Braund from the Pennsylvania Department of Health and Dr. Shauntice Allen from the University of Alabama at Birmingham School of Public Health.

To learn more about the ETSU Center for Rural Health Research, which is located in the College of Public Health, visit www.etsu.edu/cph/center_phpp/.