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Description:

A. Personal Statement

I am able to independently conduct health promotion activities, initiate high-impact evidence-based interventions to improve maternal, newborn, child, adolescent, and older people outcomes towards the attainment of the health-related Sustainable Development Goals. I became a subject-matter expert in areas such as SRH/HIV/TB/Hepatitis/Malaria/Diabetes prevention; Community-organizing; screening, testing, health education; creating viable support safety-nets and documenting progress. I am a key-note speaker and I have conducted trainings in 25 African countries. I contribute expertise to international panels and entities such as the Global Fund to fight AIDS, Tuberculosis and Malaria. I have trained over 15,000 Grassroots-based CBOs by 2024 in Africa. I built a research portfolio and authored several publications, as well as invitations to present posters at several International AIDS and TB Conferences. I immigrated to the USA where I have continued with health promotion and worked as a Long term care provider at UCSF and UCLA Hospitals in California as well as a Community Organizer.. In order to segue into international research work, I opted to pursue further studies in the USA. For my undergraduate training at Saint Mary’s College of California, I chose to study theories and subject matter on population dynamics such as those on labor, e.g. Marxian Labor theory of value; equality, e.g., Dworking’s theory of equality; liberty, e.g., Berlin’s theory of Liberty; modernism and postmodernism by Michel Foucault; multiculturalism, post Colonialism and feminism; Justice as it is explored under John Rawls’ theory of Justice; and democracy, e.g., Macpherson’s theory of democracy. With the guidance of my Professors I gained insight and developed a framework which enabled me to study the resultant phenomena arising from the connections between enabling and responsive contexts (legal, politics, economics, physical nature, infrastructure, gender, culture and sex) and people’s interests, aspirations, needs and goals. I hoped this would make me a more effective health promotion champion and advocate. I was able to develop research tools with questions probing the physical (such as one’s sex or age) and nonphysical (such as awareness or mental health) correlates of consciousness using political theory. From the responses I was able to characterize and synthesize narratives to explain imaginative perspectives making up different events in the human public life. We developed abstracts which were presented at local and International Conferences (see below). I have gained diverse data collection, data presentation, conceptual and technical skills to develop policy, planning and programming reports over the years. My work is around empowering communities to engage in community-based research work; establish determinants, distribution, disease outcomes; and thereby come up with interventions connecting beneficiaries to tools that enable them to engage in healthy living practices. I can develop tailored and targeted social-cultural heuristics catalyzing engagement, demand and uptake of health and development services in the USA by non-U.S. born American of African descent in the USA. This will be scaled to other American communities as well as Canada, Mexico, Brazil and other countries. I conduct Community Needs Assessment activities and these inform my approaches. Subsequently, data analysis, dissemination, stakeholder mapping, identifying of health champions and tailored workshops are used to improve self-development aspirations. I am confident our work and exercise are timely. It will take strategic organizing, guidance, mentoring and linkages to make the non U.S born Americans of African descent to build the critical mass of knowledge and skills to advance TB/HIV prevention outcomes which will segue into other health outcomes too such as optimal heart health or child health outcomes. Turning data into stories and telling these stories in different forms have become both a passion and profession.

A few titles I have produced:

1. Muyunga-Mukasa, T.R. Long term effects of low activity and risky nutrition practices among new Americans from East Africa: Implications for endocrinology and population health planning. Endocrinology and Metabolic Syndrome. 2013 August.
2. Muyunga-Mukasa, T.R. An Analysis of Public Ideas and Public Policy Crossroads Influencing Success Or Failure Of Protected Sex Practices By Women In Africa. Research Gate. 2019 February.
3. Muyunga-Mukasa, T.R. 44 Reasons to Reauthorize PEPFAR: Anecdotes from African Communities, March 2023-August 2023. Academia. 2023 December.
4. Muyunga-Mukasa, T.R. Challenges in Continuance, Linkage and Adherence to Optimal Anti-AIDS and TB Care Goals Among 5 Urban-based Refugee-led Support Spaces from September to November 2021. Academia. 2021 December.

B. Positions, Scientific Appointments, and Honors

Positions and Scientific Appointments

2024 – Present Member, American Heart Association (AHA)
2016 – Present Member, American Political Science Association (APSA)
2016 – Present Member, American Public Health Association (APHA)
2012 – Present Member, Global Fund
2012 – Present Member American Association for the Advancement of Science (AAAS)

Honors

2021-2024 Regis College President’s List
2020 Virtual Poster Presenter, International AIDS Conference
2019 Poster Presenter, An Analysis of Public Ideas and Public Policy Crossroads Influencing Success Or Failure Of Protected Sex Practices By Women In Africa.
2016 – 2020 Scholarship, Dean’s List
2016 Scholarship, Dean’s List

C. Contributions to Science

1. Research and community organizing: I mobilized and trained different communities to form viable health promotion groups leveraging and advancing HPV/HIV/TB/Malaria prevention
   1. Muyunga-Mukasa, T.R: Public-Private Mix (PPM) and Communities of Practice (COP): Appropriating the International Global Fund Goals to Advance Localized Social-ecological Facilitation on The Road to Zero HIV, TB, and Malaria by 2030; Academia. 2022 December
2. Undergraduate Research: I was part of different projects led by the Political Science Faculty of Saint Mary’s College of California. I worked with Dr. Susan a labor expert and Dr. Longo a justice and civil rights expert. I chose to work with refugees and asylum seekers and explored how they navigated the health and human services. Students were encouraged to pursue individual themes which were developed into reports. Stable housing, proper documentation, nutrition, mobility and livelihood activities facilitate access to social services in the health, labor and education sectors. The study provides lessons for the USA. Tailored support leads to an optimal beneficence, better life outcomes and litmus for service equity.
   1. Muyunga-Mukasa, T.R. Utilization of Social Benefits by Refugees: Study of Two Kenya based refugee-led Mutual Aid Group Safe Spaces, 2016-2019; Academia. 2020 January.
3. Graduate Research: My ongoing pre-doctoral research is focused on displacement, migration, integration and the use of social-cultural spaces and how they can stimulate engagement in healthy living practices. The results from this research will contribute knowledge on how New Americans organize and mobilize to engage in strategic life promoting activities. I am currently developing novel frameworks to be used as training heuristics; schema and primers to develop Information, Education and Communication materials; and designs for social marketing. I hope to submit reports as a first author publication in the next few months.
   1. Muyunga-Mukasa, T.R. Tuberculosis prevention knowledge, attitude, practices and behavior among non-U.S. born Americans of African descent in the District of Columbia, Maryland and Virginia (DMV) area, 2024: The end of TB is possible if these are advanced. Academia. 2024 August.