The Department of Epidemiology was pleased to begin the new academic year in August with two new faculty members. Assistant professors Dr. Nichole Nidey (16MS, 19PHD) and Dr. Shoshannah Eggers began in their roles over the summer.

Nichole Nidey

Dr. Nidey has been a proud Hawkeye throughout her educational training. She earned a BA in Anthropology and then her MS and PhD in Epidemiology at the University of Iowa. After completing her doctoral program in 2019, she continued her training in a postdoctoral position in the Division of Biostatistics and Epidemiology & the Division of Developmental and Behavioral Pediatrics at the Cincinnati Children’s Hospital Medical Center where she then became an Assistant Professor of Pediatrics until deciding to make her return to the University of Iowa.

Dr. Nidey’s research interests are in maternal child health, substance use during the timing of pregnancy and postpartum, and patient and community engaged research. While at Cincinnati Children’s, she started the EMPOWER project (empowering mothers, providers and others to weigh in as experts in research). Her current projects include her role as co-investigator on projects funded through the Health Resources and Service Administration (HRSA), and the Department of Health and Human Services Administration for Community Living. Additionally, Dr. Nidey is the principal investigator on a project for the Patient Center Outcomes Research Institute (PCORI) which aims to expand her EMPOWER from a single-state collaborative to a multi-state collaborative.     

Shoshannah Eggers 

Dr. Eggers is celebrating a homecoming of sorts in joining the Epi faculty. Originally from Iowa City and a graduate of West High School, she completed her BS degree in Microbiology from the University of Wisconsin-Madison where she then continued on to get her PhD in Population Health Sciences. After graduating, she spent time as a postdoctoral fellow at the Environmental Medicine and Public Health Department at the Icahn School of Medicine at Mt. Sinai in New York City.  

Dr. Eggers describes herself as an environmental epidemiologist and microbiome researcher. Her research interests intersect with child and maternal health, environmental epidemiology, microbiome, mixture modeling, neurological health through the life-course, childhood predictors of unhealthy aging, and developmental origins of health and disease (DOHaD). Dr. Eggers is the Co-Director and Head of Lab Facilities at the Microbial Exposomics Lab and is an associate member of the Environmental Health Sciences Research Center (EHSRC). Her current projects include her work as the principal investigator on the PROGRESS Microbiome project, a K99/R00 Pathway to Independence award from the National Institute of Environmental Health Sciences (NIEHS).