Profile

Julie N. Harris-Wai, Ph.D., MPH

Assistant Adjunct Professor

Bio

Julie N Harris-Wai, Ph.D., M.P.H. is a social and behavioral scientist at Kaiser Permanente’s (KP) Division of Research and an Assistant Adjunct Professor in the Department of Social and Behavioral Sciences at the University of California, San Francisco. Dr. Harris-Wai has a diverse background in community health promotion, bioethics, and social and behavioral sciences. She received her Ph.D. in public health genomics at the University of Washington, followed by a fellowship in population health sciences with the Robert Wood Johnson Foundation’s Health and Society Scholars Program at UC Berkeley and UC San Francisco. Dr. Harris-Wai’s research focuses on examining the social and ethical factors influencing how (and why) genomic technologies are translated from the research setting into clinical care, and the impact these technologies have on health disparities and underserved communities. The ultimate goal of Dr. Harris-Wai’s work is to identify policies and programs that improve the appropriate use of genomic technologies for all communities. In addition to being an accomplished researcher, Dr. Harris-Wai is also a dedicated educator and has taught courses in research ethics, community-based-participatory research, qualitative research methods, and Public Health Genomics. She combines her interests in education and research in her role as the associate director of the UCSF/KP Center of Excellence in research on Translational Genomics and Ethics. In this position, she collaborates with a multi-disciplinary team of investigators at UCSF and Kaiser Permanente to develop a training program focused on the bioethical, legal, and ethical implications of translational genomics (www.ct2g.org).