March 2013 VSTH Meeting Speakers

Back to Event Home Page

Speakers' Biographies

Alexander J. Kallen, MD, MPH

Medical Epidemiologist and Outbreak Response Coordinator, Division of Healthcare Quality Promotion, National Center for Emerging and Zoonotic Infectious Diseases, CDC

Alexander J. Kallen, MD, MPH, is a medical epidemiologist and outbreak response coordinator in the Division of Healthcare Quality Promotion at the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC). Dr. Kallen is also a volunteer attending physician in both the HIV clinic and infectious disease inpatient service at the Atlanta Veteran’s Affairs Medical Center. He has been with CDC since 2006, when he began serving as an Epidemic Intelligence Service officer.

Dr. Kallen has been published in a plethora of peer-reviewed publications on various topics, including healthcare-associated, invasive MRSA infections, multidrug-resistant gram-negative bacilli, infection prevention among hemodialysis patients, and the prevention of bloodstream infections. He is a reviewer for many journals, including the Annals of Internal Medicine, Emerging Infectious Diseases, and the American Journal of Kidney Diseases. Dr. Kallen is a member of the guideline committee for the Society for Healthcare Epidemiology of America.

  Top of Page

Wendy Bamberg, MD

Medical Epidemiologist and Healthcare-Associated Infections Program Manager, Colorado Department of Public Health and Environment

Wendy Bamberg, MD, created the Healthcare-Associated Infections Epidemiology Unit at the Colorado Department of Public Health and Environment in 2009. As an infectious diseases physician and medical epidemiologist, she directs the surveillance of Clostridium difficile and multidrug-resistant organisms such as methicillin-resistant Staphylococcus aureus and carbapenem-resistant Enterobacteriaceae, coordinates healthcare-associated infection outbreak investigations, and manages healthcare-associated infections public health projects for the Colorado Emerging Infections Program.

Dr. Bamberg’s interests include the public health surveillance of multidrug-resistant organisms, the prevention of antimicrobial resistance, and the promotion of safe injection practices. She is also active in the Healthcare-Associated Infections Subcommittee of the Council of State and Territorial Epidemiologists, and is a member of the Colorado Department of Public Health and Environment Institutional Review Board.

Prior to her current role, Dr. Bamberg was an Epidemic Intelligence Service officer with CDC from 2005 to 2007. She has also worked at the local level in public health in the fields of STDs and family planning.

Dr. Bamberg graduated from Kalamazoo College with a degree in Biology before receiving her medical degree from the University of Colorado School of Medicine. She completed an internal medicine residency at the Albert Einstein Medical Center and a fellowship in infectious diseases at Drexel University College of Medicine, and is board-certified in both specialties.

  Top of Page

Zintars Beldavs, MS

Manager, Healthcare-Associated Infections, Oregon Public Health Division, Oregon Health Authority

Zintars Beldavs, MS, manages the Healthcare-Associated Infections (HAI) program centered in the Acute and Communicable Disease Section of the Oregon Health Authority. Oregon's HAI program has a number of surveillance and prevention activities, including the current efforts with carbapenem-resistant Enterobacteriaceae, which grew out of work with the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention's Emerging Infections program.

Prior to Mr. Beldav’s current focus on healthcare-associated infections, he worked in research analysis and methodology on an array of projects for more than 15 years in public health, biology, and psychology. His previous work has spanned from serving the US Department of State as a Fulbright Fellow, to grant-funded projects with the Oregon Research Institute, the University of Oregon, and the Oregon Social Learning Center.

 Top of Page