Dr. Mary Jo Trepka is an infectious disease epidemiologist, who focuses on HIV/AIDS and other sexually transmitted diseases. Her particular interest is the role of social determinants in health disparities in HIV/AIDS and other infectious diseases. In 2011, she received the 2010 Presidential Early Career Award for Science and Engineering from President Barack Obama for her work analyzing the role of poverty, segregation and rural/urban status in racial disparities in HIV survival. Currently, she is studying the role of patient centered HIV care and women centered HIV care in helping people with HIV to be retained in HIV care and virally suppressed despite psychosocial barriers. Additionally, she leads the Investigator Development Core for FIU’s Research Center for Minority Institutions.
Dr. Trepka received her bachelor’s in chemistry and German at Grinnell College in 1986, her doctor of medicine from the University of Minnesota School of Medicine in 1991, and her master’s from the University of Colorado Health Sciences Center in 1994. She completed her internship in internal medicine at the University of Wisconsin-Madison in 1992, and her residency in preventive medicine and public health at the University of Colorado in 1994. Dr. Trepka trained as a postdoctoral fellow at the GSF-Research Center for Health and Environment in Munich, Germany from 1994-1996 and as an epidemic intelligence service officer at the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention from 1996-1998. She was the director of epidemiology and disease control for the Miami-Dade County Health Department from 1998–2003 and joined Florida International University full time in 2003. She is board certified in preventive medicine and public health and a fellow in the American College of Preventive Medicine.