The Urban Health Collaborative is proud to join the International Society for Urban Health (ISUH) as an institutional member. Aligning closely with the UHC’s mission, ISUH aims to improve the health of cities worldwide and is the only global professional organization in the world that focuses exclusively on the broad determinants of urban health. ISUH brings together experts from across academia, government, NGOs and business to improve the health of cities and has expanded its reach at its annual International Conference on Urban Health (ICUH) to include urban planners, architects, geographers, climate change scientists, among others.

There are many benefits to the UHC becoming a member of ISUH, including networking with other leaders in urban health, building partnerships to address global challenges and sharing what is learned throughout the organization. The affiliation has enabled Dornsife School of Public Health and Urban Health Collaborative faculty, staff and students to also join (through individual membership). There will also be opportunities to engage in events at global meetings, such as the annual conference and distribute information on UHC activities through the ISUH website.

Urban Health Collaborative faculty and staff have previously participated in ISUH’s annual global conference, the International Conference on Urban Health (ICUH), including last year’s conference held in Kampala, Uganda. The SALURBAL project held a pre-symposium workshop on “How to make the impossible possible: Lessons learned (so far) from the SALURBAL project,” led by SALURBAL researchers from throughout the Latin American region, and by Gina Lovasi, PhD, MPH, Claire Slesinski, MSPH, and UHC fellow Dustin Fry, MPH.

The team members discussed the tools that the large international team uses to stay organized and connected, presented the process for gathering and harmonizing a large international urban health data set for secondary analysis, described innovative methods and tools for data collection in an urban informal settlement in Bogotá, Colombia, led a demonstration of how to use Google Street View to audit the pedestrian environment, and engaged participants in a participatory systems modeling exercise and demonstration. As an executive board member, Lovasi also chaired several sessions, including one in which UHC postdoctoral fellow Allana Forde, PhD, MPH degree presented work on water contamination and the oral microbiome.

UHC looks forward to further collaboration and partnership with ISUH. To learn more about ISUH, click here.