Mary E. Aitken, MD, MPH

Dr. Mary Aitken, PhD, MPH is a Co-Investigator for the University of Texas Health Science Center at Houston project “Launching the Houston-HVIP: Developing and Evaluating a Hospital-Based Intervention to Reduce Recurrent Violence.” She is a member of the Policy, Implementation and Economic Evaluation workgroup for the Community Firearm Violence Prevention Network.

Dr. Mary Aitken’s research, grounded in her experience as a primary care pediatrician, focuses on primary and secondary prevention of pediatric injury, including major injury mechanisms that disproportionately impact the health of disadvantaged children. This includes research in motor vehicle passenger safety, all-terrain vehicle safety, and home safety (safe sleep, firearms storage) to reduce the burden of injuries on high risk populations. Assessment of health-related quality of life and outcomes following serious injury and illness, especially traumatic brain injury, is another area of long-term interest. For this project, she will collaborate with the project team applying experience in rigorous evaluation of injury prevention interventions, epidemiology, and clinical pediatrics.