Robert Bollinger, MD, MPH

Dr. Bollinger is Founding Director of the Center for Clinical Global Health Education (CCGHE) and Professor of Infectious Diseases at the Johns Hopkins University (JHU) School of Medicine. He holds joint appointments in international health at the Johns Hopkins (JH) Bloomberg School of Public Health, and in community public health at the JH School of Nursing. He is Associate Director for Medicine of the JH Center for Global Health, Director of the JHU Fogarty India Program, and course instructor for the Global Health Intersession Course for JH medical students, which links medical students and faculty around the globe, and Director of the newly formed IMEC-JHU Partnership to advance applications in healthcare, combining JH clinical and research expertise with IMEC nanoelectronic capabilities. He is board certified by the American Board of Internal Medicine in internal medicine and infectious diseases.

Dr. Bollinger has more than 35 years of experience in international public health, clinical research, and education dealing with such global health priorities as HIV/AIDS, malaria, tuberculosis, leprosy, dengue, antibiotic resistant infections and other emerging diseases. His research interests include identifying biological and behavioral risk factors for HIV transmission; characterizing the clinical progression and treatment of HIV and related infections; and implementing science research projects to optimize healthcare capacity and delivery in resource-limited settings. He has been invited to participate in public health training programs and expert committees, and has been consulted for his expertise by more than 15 countries. He served as a member of the US Presidential Advisory Council for HIV/AIDS (PACHA), and a member of the PACHA International Sub-committee, and is a current member of the Institute of Medicine Forum on Public-Private Partnerships for Global Health and Safety. Working with partners in more than 20 countries, Dr. Bollinger and CCGHE faculty pioneered the development and use of distance learning and their award-winning mobile health platform (emocha®) in resource-limited settings (www.emocha.com).

Dr. Bollinger is committed to improving the health of people living in resource-limited nations through clinical research, education, and leadership training. He established and has sustained programs in countries throughout Africa, South and Central America, Southeast Asia, and the Middle East. He currently leads the JHU team providing technical support to the Medical Education Partnership Initiative (MEPI) in Uganda, where he has worked for more than 15 years. In 1991, he initiated an ongoing, NIH-funded Indo-US HIV research program in Pune, India, involving the National AIDS Research Institute/ICMR and the BJ Medical College. He has served as Principal Investigator for many NIH-supported studies and clinical trials in Pune, including the SWEN study, which changed World Health Organization (WHO) guidelines for treatment of infants born to HIV/positive mothers to prevent mother-to-child transmission. Under his leadership of the Hopkins Fogarty International Program, short-term and degree training has been provided to more than 100 visiting scientists at JHU, and in-country training has been provided to more than 2000 Indian scientists. His commitment to clinician education has been honored with the Johns Hopkins Department of Medicine David M. Levine Excellence in Mentoring Award

Dr. Bollinger is author of more than 150 peer-reviewed research publications and 15 book chapters, including the first and largest studies of risk factors for HIV transmission in India, the cloning and sequencing of the first HIV viruses from India, the only studies characterizing the primary immune response to HIV in India, and the demonstration of increased risk of HIV acquisition with recent HSV infection and lack of circumcision.

Dr. Bollinger received an undergraduate degree from Haverford College, a Doctor of Medicine from Dartmouth Medical School, and a Master of Public Health from JH Bloomberg School of Public Health. He completed his internal medicine training at the University of Maryland Medical Systems, followed by a post-doctoral fellowship in infectious diseases at JHU School of Medicine.

Conflict of Interest: Receives royalties from emocha Health, miDiagnostics, consulting fees from Merck, Hologic, and grant funding from emocha Health.