2020 Junior Scientist Officer of the Year Award Winner
LCDR Shondelle Wilson-Frederick
LCDR Shondelle Wilson-Frederick currently serves as a Technical Director for Analytics in the Division of Quality and Health Outcomes (DQHO), Center for Medicaid and CHIP Services (CMCS), Centers for Medicare & Medicaid Services (CMS). In this role, she manages an innovative enterprise-wide research portfolio aimed at improving the quality and availability of Medicaid and CHIP data supporting two critical CMS quality initiatives: the Medicaid and CHIP Adult and Child Core Sets and the Medicaid Quality Rating System.
LCDR Wilson-Frederick has extensive experience studying relationships between health outcomes and social determinants of health aimed at advancing equity for all Americans. As a Statistician in the CMS Office of Minority Health (OMH), she produced several widely utilized health disparities manuscripts and directed the annual public release of national and contract level Medicare quality data for more than 500 health plans stratified by race, ethnicity and gender. She was the only CMS representative and junior PHS officer selected for the prestigious 2018 Federal Data Fellowship and received the 2019 Gears of Government Award for notable contributions to the Federal Data Strategy.
LCDR Wilson-Frederick is a nationally recognized sickle cell disease (SCD) expert and her leadership has positioned HHS and CMS to improve the quality of care for Medicare, Medicaid and CHIP beneficiaries with SCD. She has developed a claims-based CMS SCD algorithm that identifies beneficiaries with SCD and a new Healthy People 2030 measure on the receipt of evidenced-based therapies for Medicare beneficiaries with SCD. She serves on the HHS SCD Workgroup, leads the CMS SCD Workgroup and the HHS SCD Research and Clinical Trials Subgroup, and served as a guest editor and reviewer for September 2020 HHS-sponsored Annals of Emergency Medicine SCD supplement. Her expertise spearheaded development of the first HHS SCD Infographic that was released during the 2020 White House SCD Roundtable hosted by the First Lady of the United States.
As the co-founder and co-chair of the PACE SCD Workgroup, LCDR Wilson-Frederick oversees curriculum development for healthcare providers on SCD pain management therapies. To increase awareness of genetic blood disorders, like SCD, she co-led the inaugural SciPAC Battle of the USPHS Commissioned Corps Categories Blood Drive at 54th USPHS Symposium, saving nearly 300 lives. Her additional SciPAC recognitions include launching the Fist Bump to recognize officer’s achievements and serving as the first Executive Secretary of the Website Subcommittee.
LCDR Wilson-Frederick holds a PhD in Bacteriology from the University of Wisconsin-Madison and postdoctoral training in Cancer Epidemiology from the Johns Hopkins Bloomberg School of Public Health. She is a dedicated mentor for underrepresented professionals in STEM-related fields. In addition, she pursues her passion of service by volunteering as a coach to families desiring financial freedom.
2020 Derek Dunn Memorial Senior Scientist Officer of the Year Award Winner
CDR Qiao Bobo
CDR Bobo is a Division Director, leading three branches and overseeing quality evaluation of manufacturing of sterile drugs at the Food and Drug Administration (FDA). Previously, CDR Bobo served as a Branch Chief in FDA, where she supervised a diverse professional staff, oversaw pre-market inspections and quality evaluation of vaccines, therapeutics, cell gene products and devices. CDR Bobo’s leadership and effort protect millions of lives nationally and globally by ensuring the safety and availability of hundreds of critical medical products. Prior to joining the FDA in 2010, CDR Bobo spent 12 years in the private sector, from small startup company to big pharma, drafting regulatory submissions and ensuring compliance. CDR Bobo holds a Ph.D. degree in Cell and Molecular Biology from the University of Vermont.
CDR Bobo is fully committed to the mission of the United States Public Health Service. She has been deployed 13 times since 2014 including a deployment to Monrovia Medical Unit in Liberia for the Ebola response and the 2017 Hurricanes Maria/Irma and 2020 COVID-19 responses. CDR Bobo has been an active participant in various organizations such as the Scientist Professional Advisory Committee (SciPAC), Asian Pacific American Officer Committee (APAOC), Junior Officer Advisory Group (JOAG), Association of Military Surgeons of the United States (AMSUS), Commissioned Corps Association (COA) and COA District of Columbia Local Branch (DC COA). She has held numerous leadership roles including SciPAC Executive Board Member, subcommittee chair and team lead, SciPAC Voting Member, JOAG Voting Member and Liaison to SciPAC, and DC COA President, Vice President and Executive Board member.
CDR Bobo received numerous awards including the 2020 AMSUS Rising Star Award, 2020 JOAG VADM Richard H. Carmona Inspiration Award, 2020 Scientist Mentor of the Year Award, 2020 FDA Admirals’ Mentorship Award, and the 2015 Junior Scientist Officer of the Year Award and 2015 APAOC RADM Kenneth Moritsugu Junior Officer of the Year Award.
2020 Scientist Responder of the Year Award Winner
CAPT Kate Brett
CAPT Kate M. Brett, as Senior Coordinating Officer (SCO) of the USPHS National Incident Support Teams (NIST) since 2016, has been instrumental in developing relationships, processes, and opportunities for USPHS Corps officers to train and deploy in support of ASPR medical and public health responses. She began working towards this position first in OFRD’s Secretary’s Emergency Response Team during Hurricane Rita, and then moved to NIST-B in 2009 where she was designated as a planning officer, then deputy team commander, and finally team commander in 2013. She herself has maintained continuous basic level of readiness since November 2003 and has deployed through CDC and Commissioned Corps Headquarters to 19 different events and incidents during her career. These include Hurricanes Andrew (1992), Gustav, Hanna and Ike (2008), the Presential Inauguration (2004), Superstorm Sandy (2012), the Republican National Convention (2016), Hurricanes Harvey and Maria (2017), the CDC Ebola Response (2014) and the COVID-19 Response (2020). She is fully credentialed as a Situation Unit Leader and Resource Unit Leader.
As NIST SCO, CAPT Brett has worked closely with ASPR’s Incident Response Team (IMT) Program to establish a force laydown structure for the NIST teams that will provide enough augmentation for the NDMS personnel to reach optimal IMT bench strength while also allowing for adequate opportunities for NIST officers to deploy and in so doing, create the opportunity for PHS officers to be credentialed members of the IMT. She has worked closely with ASPR leadership over the last five years to open IMT-sponsored training opportunities for PHS officers that are required for position credentialing, with the goal of creating trained and experienced non-clinical deployment roles for USPHS deployers.
CAPT Brett works in the Office of the Director, Division of Vital Statistics at the National Center for Health Statistics, Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, where she has been for 29 years. After getting her PhD in epidemiology at the University of North Carolina, Chapel Hill, she began her career as an EIS Officer at CDC. Her current focus is vital statistics data modernization, where she is leading the development of HL7 FHIR-based data interoperability between state medical examiners and coroners, state vital statistics offices, the National Vital Statistics System and state and federal surveillance programs. She also has worked extensively doing epidemiological research in the area of women’s health and women’s health care utilization.
2020 Scientist Mentor of the Year Award Winner
CDR Qiao Bobo
CDR Bobo is a Division Director, leading three branches and overseeing quality evaluation of manufacturing of sterile drugs at the Food and Drug Administration (FDA). Previously, CDR Bobo served as a Branch Chief in FDA, where she supervised a diverse professional staff, oversaw pre-market inspections and quality evaluation of vaccines, therapeutics, cell gene products and devices. CDR Bobo’s leadership and effort protect millions of lives nationally and globally by ensuring the safety and availability of hundreds of critical medical products. Prior to joining the FDA in 2010, CDR Bobo spent 12 years in the private sector, from small startup company to big pharma, drafting regulatory submissions and ensuring compliance. CDR Bobo holds a Ph.D. degree in Cell and Molecular Biology from the University of Vermont.
CDR Bobo is fully committed to the mission of the United States Public Health Service. She has been deployed 13 times since 2014 including a deployment to Monrovia Medical Unit in Liberia for the Ebola response and the 2017 Hurricanes Maria/Irma and 2020 COVID-19 responses. CDR Bobo has been an active participant in various organizations such as the Scientist Professional Advisory Committee (SciPAC), Asian Pacific American Officer Committee (APAOC), Junior Officer Advisory Group (JOAG), Association of Military Surgeons of the United States (AMSUS), Commissioned Corps Association (COA) and COA District of Columbia Local Branch (DC COA). She has held numerous leadership roles including SciPAC Executive Board Member, subcommittee chair and team lead, SciPAC Voting Member, JOAG Voting Member and Liaison to SciPAC, and DC COA President, Vice President and Executive Board member.
CDR Bobo received numerous awards including the 2020 AMSUS Rising Star Award, 2020 JOAG VADM Richard H. Carmona Inspiration Award, 2020 Senior Scientist Officer of the Year Award, 2020 FDA Admirals’ Mentorship Award, 2015 Junior Scientist Officer of the Year Award and 2015 APAOC RADM Kenneth Moritsugu Junior Officer of the Year Award.
CDR Bobo has mentored five officers and one civilian formally through the SciPAC mentoring program and FDA mentoring program during the past five years. CDR Bobo is also an informal mentor to many officers and civilians. In addition, she participated in the Johns Hopkins University career counseling program and Federal Future Star Program as a mentor.
