March Alumni Spotlight with Brian Miller
Brian Miller (pictured right with son Jacob), age 30 of Newark, Ohio, received an MD and MPH through Ohio State’s five-year, combined-degree program in 2005. His academic advisor was Benita Jackson-Smoot. He now works as a resident physician at the Medical College of Georgia in Augusta, Ga., and is currently fulfilling a four-year training program in psychiatry.
What do you enjoy about your current job?
Although the training is demanding at times, I enjoy the challenge of working with patients with mental illness. I also enjoy opportunities to teach and mentor medical students, and to pursue exciting research questions.
Do you have a fond OSU memory to share?
I have one serious and one fun memory to share.
Serious: I had the opportunity to complete my MPH practicum at the Ohio Department of Mental Health (ODMH). I thoroughly enjoyed working with Dr. Dale Svendsen (former ODMH medical director) and Dr. C. Bayard Paschall, III (chief of the Office of Quality Improvement), who became colleagues and friends. We published the findings from my MPH culminating project in the journal Psychiatric Services in Oct. 2006, and we continue to collaborate on other projects. My experience with my practicum at ODMH positively influenced my decision to pursue a research career in academic medicine.
Fun: From about age five until I graduated from high school, I attended almost every Ohio State home football game with my father. My dad and I had the opportunity to go to the Fiesta Bowl National Championship game versus Miami in 2003, which was the most exciting OSU football game I’ve ever seen. Go Bucks!
What’s one thing you learned at the College of Public Health that’s helped you in “the real world?”
As a psychiatric epidemiologist, I rely daily on the basic concepts and tools learned from my MPH coursework in epidemiology. My MPH practicum and culminating project honed my skills in literature searches and manuscript preparation, which are essential in research.
What public health issues most concern you?
Schizophrenia has a lifetime prevalence of about one percent, and is associated with a decrease in average life span of at least 20 percent in the U.S. Several studies have found that patients with schizophrenia die, on average, 20 to 30 years earlier than peers without this mental illness. Although suicides are a common cause of death, another leading cause of mortality and comorbidity in patients with schizophrenia is cardiovascular disease and the metabolic syndrome (which includes obesity, Type 2 Diabetes and high cholesterol).
While factors such as smoking, poor health habits, less frequent routine medical care, and side effects from antipsychotic medication contribute to this burden, there is growing evidence that factors inherent to the pathophysiology of schizophrenia also increase risk.
My research focuses on the epidemiology of risk factors for mortality and medical comorbidity in patients with schizophrenia.
What advice do you have for others who are interested in pursuing a career in public health?
Find something about which you are passionate and pursue it in depth. Identify a strong mentor early in your career. Be confident in yourself, but don’t be afraid to ask for assistance. Listen to your patients, clients and colleagues – they will inspire you.
Anything else?
I’m taking the “unusual” step of interrupting my clinical training for one year, beginning July 2008, to pursue a research fellowship in psychotic disorder epidemiology at MCG. As a part of my research fellowship, I am pursuing a Ph. D. in Medical Science at the University of Oulu (Finland). I will work from Augusta, but travel to Oulu and Helsinki, Finland, periodically over the next three years to work directly with collaborators.
My thesis will involve studies of paternal age at birth as a risk factor for psychosis and mortality in the Northern Finland 1966 Birth Cohort.
