Profiles

Sunita Dodani, MBBS (MD), FCPS, MSc, PhD, FAHA

Dr. Sunita Dodani MBBS (MD), MSc, FCPS, PhD, FAHA Professor and Founding Director, Healthcare Analytics and Delivery Science Institute (HADSI).

Dr. Sunita Dodani is a Professor of Medicine in the Department of Internal Medicine at Eastern Virginia Medical School (EVMS). She holds a secondary appointment as an epidemiologist in the School of Health Professions, EVMS. She is the Founding Director of the EVMS-Sentara Healthcare Analytics and Delivery Science Institute (HADSI). She earned her medical degree from the Aga Khan University in Karachi, Pakistan. She completed her residency in Family Medicine with further training in Preventive Cardiology.  Later, she completed her Master's in Epidemiology and Community Health from the Dalhousie University, Halifax, Canada, followed by a Ph.D. in Epidemiology (cardiovascular diseases major) from the University of Pittsburgh. She was honored with 2 Fulbright scholarships to complete her Master’s and Ph.D.

Dr. Dodani has been in executive-level leadership for over 23 years and has vast experience in research management and expertise in creating innovative models of health promotion. Before moving to EVMS, she was at the Mayo Clinic, Jacksonville, Florida campus, where she trained many physicians as clinician researchers. With over 25 years of experience as a mentor, Dr. Dodani is nationally and internationally known for her exceptional mentoring, and to date she has produced over 70 physician-scientists with a successful track record.

Healthcare analytics is vastly underutilized in the Hampton Roads region primarily due to a lack of sufficient coordination between clinical research and healthcare delivery.  To fill this void, EVMS and Sentara Healthcare Systems came together as partners. Under their charter, the EVMS-Sentara Healthcare Analytics and Delivery Science Institute (HADSI) was established in 2017 to serve as the hub for Biomedical and Clinical Research in the Hampton Roads area. In just five years, under Dr. Dodani’s exceptional leadership, HADSI is now recognized as the model for research innovation through healthcare analytic tools. HADSI aspires to translate discoveries into evidence-based, efficient processes and procedures by developing a collaborative framework for conducting focused and prioritized research in the Hampton Roads community (www.evms.edu/hadsi). 

Dr. Dodani is an NIH funded outcome implementation scientist. Her research expertise is on health disparities related to cardiovascular diseases (CVD), hypertension, Type 2 diabetes, and obesity. With NIH funding, she has developed several CVD prevention programs that are widely used in ethnic/racial communities nationwide. For example, her “Fit Body and Soul”- a diabetes prevention program for African American high-risk communities, was funded by NIH-NIDDK; and “HEALS”- a hypertension control program has shown effectiveness in significantly improving blood pressure in African American communities. HEALS is now up and running in Norfolk clinics and will soon be implemented in Filipino communities.  She is a big advocate of PCORI grants and has written many. Currently her PCORI on implementing HEALS program in Filipinos is under review for funding

In 2020, soon after COVID, she established the “Health Equity Collaborative of Virginia,” which is participated by 12 academic institutions and 5 major healthcare systems in Virginia. This collaborative has brought organizations together on one platform to reduce and eventually eliminate health disparities in the region through partnerships and team science. With over 25 years’ experience in mentoring, Dr. Dodani is nationally and internationally known for her exceptional mentoring skills. She has produced over 70 physician-scientists with a successful track record.

Dr. Dodani has been a part of numerous publications and articles with EVMS. Some of these include:

EVMS Magazine Issue 14.1 - Our Global DNA Feature - An interview with Dr. Dodani discussing her past and what brought her to work in the medical field.

How COVID-19 has Impacted Mental Health - Dr. Dodani conducted analyses proving that the pandemic has had a severe impact on mental health, concerns tripling from 2019 to 2021. 

COVIDSmart - Recovering from the Pandemic - Following the pandemic efforts were made to determine strategies for handing similar situations in the future. In this article Dr. Dodani responds to why programs like COVIDSmart are necessary and how emotional, social, and economic impacts need to be considered as well as health. 

My Story: Dr. Sunita Dodani - A video produced by EVMS discussing Dr. Dodani's personal life story.