Biography
Dr. Sheppard is an experienced Director of Medical Education with a demonstrated history of developing health equity, diversity & inclusion curricula, medical humanities curricula, medical anthropology curricula, conducting mixed-methodology research and community based participatory research. Dr. Sheppard is also a strong medical humanities and community engagement professional with a PhD in Medical Humanities from the University of Texas Medical Branch--making her the first African American in the United States to graduate with a PhD in that field. Dr. Sheppard's dissertation was entitled "The Parallax of Personalized Medicine: A Critical, Socio-medical Analysis of the Trajectory of Pharmacogenomics and Genome Wide Association Studies." She also holds a MA in Medical Anthropology from the University of Houston and is a member of Phi Kappa Phi honors society and Golden Key honors society.
Currently, Dr. Sheppard is an Assistant Professor/Medical Education Facilitator at the University of Illinois at Urbana Champaign, Carle College of Medicine, a Co-Director of the Bioethics and Medical Humanities (BMH) Thread at University of Illinois at Urbana Champaign, Carle College of Medicine, and Director of Medical Education and Social Scientific Research at The Medical Humanities and Health Disparities Institute.
Research Interests
- Examining the molecularization and biologization of racialization in personalized/precision medicine
- Exploring the nexus of institutionalized medical inequity, social determinants of health, and health disparities
- Analyzing the relationship between medical inequities and natural/unnatural disasters
- Assessing the intersection of technology, ethics, the practice of medicine, biomedicine, and medical education
- Reviewing poetry as narrative medicine and catharsis
Education
- Ph.D., Medical Humanities University of Texas medical Branch
- M.A., Medical Anthropology University of Houston
- B.A., Biological Anthropology University of New Orleans
- American Association of Medical College Certificate, Fundamental Role of the Arts and Humanities in Medical Education Program Evaluation Course (FRAHME)
- Post-Baccalaureate Certificate, Protection of Human Research Participants National Institute of Health Office of Research Training
- National Student Exchange, Medical Anthropology University of Hawai’i and Hilo