CDC Health Marketing Expert to Speak at UA

TUSCALOOSA, Ala. – Dr. Jay Bernhardt, director of the National Center for Health Marketing at the U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, will give a public talk on “Public Health 2.0: Improving Health through Health Marketing and Social Media” Thursday, Sept. 18 at 3:30 p.m. in 247 Paul W. Bryant Academic Center on The University of Alabama campus.

Bernhardt will discuss Web tools and techniques crucial in health care and in disease control and prevention. Health communicators and educators have increasingly had success with campaigns tailored to the specific needs and interests of the many and various groups that constitute society.

The CDC marketing center is one of the newest national centers at CDC and specializes in health marketing programs and services that are high-impact, science-based and customer-centered. It promotes and conducts health marketing and communications research and develops and evaluates strategies for presenting and disseminating health information, programs and services.

Before joining the CDC in August 2005, Bernhardt was an assistant professor of behavioral sciences and health education at the Rollins School of Public Health at Emory University and the founding director of the Emory Center for Public Health Communication. Prior to that, he was an assistant professor of health promotion and behavior at the University of Georgia. Bernhardt’s research and instruction have focused on health communication, social marketing and media, with an emphasis on information technology, e-health and strategic communication.

This talk, free of charge and open to the public, is co-sponsored by The University of Alabama’s Capstone College of Nursing, College of Communication and Information Sciences and the College of Human Environmental Sciences.