Get PHIT UTA Team
Dr. Denise Hernandez
Assistant Professor, Department of Kinesiology
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Dr. Hernandez received her PhD from the College of Architecture, Planning, and Public Affairs (CAPPA) in Public and Urban Administration at the University of Texas at Arlington (UTA). She earned her Master of Public Health from the Texas A&M School of Public Health, and a Bachelor of Science in Allied Health from Texas A&M University. Her research focuses on professional and social support for Community Health Workers (CHWs), CHW organizational development, as well as collaborating with CHWS to facilitate access between the community and healthcare/social services. She has worked alongside CHWs for over 10 years and is a Texas state certified CHW instructor. Dr. Hernandez is the founder of the DFW Community Health Worker Association as well as a member of the founding Board of Directors for the Texas Association of CHWs/Promotores. Denise is a member of UTA’s inaugural research team awarded the Coalition of Urban Serving Universities Racial Justice, Equity Program Award. Dr. Hernandez currently teaches in the Public Health program at UTA and continues working to strengthen the support for the CHW workforce through research and policy at the local, state, and national level. In 2021, Dr. Hernandez received the 2021 Ford Mujeres Legendarias Award for her work and service to the Hispanic/Latinx community.
Marion J Ball
Executive Director of Multi-Interprofessional Center for Health Informatics (MICHI)
Chair and Presidential Distinguished Professor, Department of Bioengineering
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Raj and Indra Nooyi Endowed Distinguished Chair in Bioengineering, Presidential Distinguished Professor, and Executive Director of the Multi-Interprofessional Center for Health Informatics.
Dr. Marion Ball is an international innovator, educator, author, and member of the National Academy of Medicine (NAM) with over forty-five years of experience in the healthcare IT community. Her research focuses are on health informatics, curriculum design, education, and research towards bringing enabling technology from theory into practice. Dr. Ball served and continues to serve on a variety of boards, i.e., the Board of Regents of the National Library of Medicine (NLM), President of the International Medical Informatics Association (IMIA), board member of the American Medical Informatics Association (AMIA), Health on The Net (HON), College of Health Information Management Executives (CHIME), American Health Information Management Association (AHIMA), Co-Chaired the Health Information Management Systems Society (HIMSS) and the International Academy of Health Sciences Informatics (IAHSI). She is a founding member of the TIGER (Technology Informatics Guiding Education Reform).
Dr. Ball received numerous awards for her contributions to the world and was named as one of the Most Influential Women in Health IT by HIMSS. She also was awarded the high honor given by the American Medial Informatics Association AMIA, the Morris Collen Award., as well as the Francois Grémy award, the highest honor given in Health Informatics, given by the International Medical Informatics Association( IMIA ). Dr. Ball has over 400 publications in textbooks, journal articles, and book chapters.
Faculty Profile
Chengkai Li
Chair and Professor, Department of Computer Science and Engineering
MICHI Affiliate
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Dr. Chengkai Li is a Professor and Associate Chair of the Department of Computer Science and Engineering at the University of Texas at Arlington. He is also the Executive Program Director of Master of Science in Data Science and a Co-Director of the Center for Artificial Intelligence and Big Data (CARIDA). His research interests are in several areas related to big data intelligence and data science, including databases, data mining, machine learning, and natural language processing. Dr. Li and his collaborators pioneered the interdisciplinary field of computational fact-checking.
Faculty Profile
Jitenga Knox
Administrative Services Officer II
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Jitenga Knox is the Administrative Assistant II for the Center. Hailing from Illinois, she received her Bachelor of Science in Kinesiology with a concentration in Sports Management and a minor in Business Administration from Eastern Illinois University in 2013. Working for the University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign from 2013-2018 instilled her with the skills needed for her transition to Texas’ administration. She was employed with UTA’s Department of Kinesiology from 2018-2020. Jitenga joined MICHI from its launch in March 2020 and has been able to combine her sports-minded, innovative, and forward-thinking mindset, as well as her professionalism and healthcare knowledge to advance the mission and vision of the Center and UTA.
Staff Profile