Presenter

Dr. Rupa Valdez is a professor at the University of Virginia with joint appointments in the School
of Engineering and Applied Sciences and the School of Medicine and serves as president of the
Blue Trunk Foundation. Dr. Valdez merges the disciplines of human factors engineering, health
informatics, and cultural anthropology to understand and support the ways in which people
manage health at home and in the community. Her work draws heavily on community
engagement with community organizations and individuals from multiple health disparity
populations, and has been supported by the NIH, AHRQ, NSF, PCORI, and the USDA, among
others. She has testified before Congress on the topic of health equity for the disability
community and received the Jack A. Kraft Innovator Award from the Human Factors and
Ergonomics Society (HFES). Among other appointments, she serves as associate editor for the
Journal of American Medical Informatics Association Open, on the Board of Directors for the
American Association of People with Disabilities, and as an advisor for PCORI’s Patient
Engagement Advisory Panel and for NCQA’s Health Equity Expert Work Group. Dr. Valdez
received her PhD at the University of Wisconsin-Madison.