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Liana Petruzzi Assistant Professor CAS | DHS | Health Studies

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Liana Petruzzi
CAS | Health Studies
Main Campus
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Additional Positions at Â鶹ÊÓƵ
Assistant Professor at the School of Education
Degrees
PhD, MSW

Bio
Dr. Liana Petruzzi is a dually-appointed, assistant professor in Health and Education Equity in the School of Education and the College of Arts and Sciences. She is a health equity researcher and licensed clinical social worker. She has worked in healthcare and hospital settings for over a decade, with a focus on interdisciplinary intervention implementation, evaluation, and healthcare policies.

Her research is focused on how interdisciplinary interventions with community health workers, doulas, and/or social workers can improve health and mental health outcomes among marginalized populations. She is particularly interested in healthcare access and health disparities among pregnant and postpartum individuals.

She is currently the evaluator on a $5 million HRSA grant (2024-2029) in partnership with Healthy Start of Central Texas, Black Mamas ATX and Healing Hands Community Doula Project. The primary goals of this project are:

1. Expand pre-existing multi-sectoral collaborative networks to establish a community consortium with maternal health and infant health stakeholders.
2. Expand access to perinatal support services for Black and Latina women and birthing persons in Central Texas.
3. Improve Black and Latina maternal and infant outcomes in Central Texas, including access to prenatal and postpartum healthcare, breastfeeding rates, depression screening and mental health service referrals.

As a community-based participatory researcher, she looks forward to identifying new community partners within the Washington DC, Maryland, and Virginia (DMV) area, and exploring opportunities to integrate health and social care interventions into school and community settings.

Dr. Petruzzi received her PhD and MSSW from the University of Texas at Austin in 2022 and 2016 respectively, and her BA in Psychology from Brandeis University in 2009.
See Also
INSPIRE Lab
For the Media
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Teaching

Fall 2024

  • HLTH-240 Intro to Health Promotion

Spring 2025

  • HLTH-240 Intro to Health Promotion

Partnerships & Affiliations

  • American Public Health Association's Public Health Social Work Section
    Policy Chair

  • Community Health Worker (CHW) and Social Worker (SW) National Workgroup
    Research Lead

Scholarly, Creative & Professional Activities

Grants and Sponsored Research

HRSA, Healthy Start, 2024-2029: Evaluator and Co-Investigator

Black Mamas ATX (BMATX) and Healing Hands Community Doula Project (HHCDP), members of the Maternal Health Equity Collaborative in Austin, Texas received a 5-year, multi-million dollar grant to provide Healthy Start services in Central Texas. Healthy Start provides 3 primary types of services: case management and care coordination, group-based prenatal, postpartum, and parenting education, and behavioral health services. 

BMATX and HHCDP will provide a continuum of perinatal services through Healthy Start Central Texas. This program will address gaps in maternal health services for Black women by increasing the perinatal support service workforce. This program will provide holistic, culturally congruent perinatal care through community-based, perinatal support services which includes full-spectrum doula support, birth education, case management (PCHWs), mental health support (professional mental health counseling and support groups), and parent education (doulas, PCHWs and group classes).  

The primary goals of this grant and program are as follows: 

  1. Expand pre-existing multi-sectoral collaborative networks to establish a community consortium with maternal health and infant health stakeholders. 

  1. Expand access to perinatal support services for Black and Latina women and birthing persons in Central Texas. 

  1. Improve Black maternal and infant outcomes in Central Texas based on pre-specified, Healthy Start benchmarks: access to prenatal and postpartum healthcare, breastfeeding rates, depression screening and mental health service referrals, health behaviors during the perinatal period, infant care, and infant healthcare access. 

Selected Publications

  1. Petruzzi, L.J., Smithwick, J., Lee, L., Delva, J., Fox, L., Wilkinson, G., Vohra-Gupta, S., Aranda, M., Valdez, C.R., Jones, B.J., & the Community Health Worker (CHW) and Social Worker (SW) National Workgroup. (2024). Community health work and social work collaboration and integration in healthcare and public health settings: A conceptual framework. Journal of Ambulatory Care Management, 47(3), 187-202.

  2. Vohra-Gupta., S., Maclaine, B., Kim, N., Petruzzi, L.J., & Rhodes, D. (2024). Critical Race Theory in Social Work Education & Policy Practice: A Scoping Review. Social Work Education, 1-13.

  3. Petruzzi, L.J., Milano, N., Chen, Q., Noel, L., Golden, R., & Jones, B. (2024). Social Workers are Key to Addressing Social Determinants of Health in Integrated Care Settings. Social Work in Health Care, 63(2), 89-101.

  4. Chatham, A., Petruzzi, L.J., Garza, B., Brode, M., Patel, S., Garza, B., Hanson, K., Garay, R., Cook, R., Mercer, T. & Valdez, C. (2023).ÌýStructural Factors Contributing to Compassion Fatigue, Burnout, and Secondary Traumatic Stress Among Hospital-Based Healthcare Professionals During the COVID-19 Pandemic. Qualitative Health Research.

Research Interests

Healthcare access; perinatal health and mental health disparities; interdisciplinary interventions in healthcare, public health and community settings particularly with community health workers (CHWs), doulas and/or social workers