Primary Appointment

Lorna McNeill, PhD, MPH, is an assistant professor of health disparities research in the Department of Health Disparities at the University of Texas MD Anderson Cancer Center. Dr. McNeill received a B.A. from the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill, a M.P.H. from the University of North Carolina School of Public Health, and a Ph.D. from Saint Louis University School of Public Health. Dr. McNeill’s research is on the elimination of cancer-related health disparities in minority populations. Her research has particular emphasis on understanding the influence of social contextual determinants of cancer in minorities, with a special focus of the role of physical activity as a key preventive behavior. Her research takes place in minority and underserved communities such as public housing developments, black churches, community-based clinics and low-income neighborhoods—communities with excess cancer death rates. She is PI of several community-based studies, primarily working with African American churches. One is a longitudinal cohort study of 1,500 African American adults designed to examine the role of lifestyle/behavioral, social, and environmental factors on health and cancer-related disparities over time. Another study is focused on designing a peer-delivered motivational interviewing intervention to increase physical activity among sedentary African American women. The final recently funded study is designed to evaluate the efficacy of a culturally-tailored motivational intervening intervention for improving diet and physical activity among sedentary African Americans.  She is also PI of a mhealth intervention using state-of-the-art ecological momentary assessment designed to understand individual, social, and environmental determinants of physical activity among African American and Latino adults. Dr. McNeill is co-director of the Center for Community-Engaged Translational Research (CCETR) at MD Anderson. CCETR serves as a divisional and institutional resource focused on changing public health and clinical practice through the development, evaluation, implementation and dissemination of new interventions and diagnostic tests in community and population-based settings. She is also the subaward PI of the Community Engagement Core of the joint Clinical and Translational Science Award to the University of Teas Health Science Center at Houston and MD Anderson Cancer Center. Dr. McNeill has won several awards and honors including being inducted into Delta Omega, the National Honorary Society in Public Health and was the recipient of the 2011 Julie and Ben Rogers Award for Excellence at MD Anderson Cancer Center. 

Administrative Appointments/Responsibilities

Institutional Committee Activities

Last updated: 3/12/2013