Dwayne Jarman
Dwayne
Jarman, Grand Traverse Band of Ottawa and Chippewa
Indians, is a doctor of veterinary medicine (DVM) with
a master's degree in public health (MPH). Currently,
he is a Centers for Disease Control and Prevention
(CDC) Preventive Medicine Fellow with the Alcohol and
Public Health Team in the National Center for Chronic
Disease Prevention and Health Promotion at CDC. There
he is involved in the development and evaluation of
strategies (e.g., laws or regulations limiting the
number of bars in a particular geographical area) to
prevent excessive alcohol consumption and related
harms.
The following article about Dr. Jarman was published in the
Autumn 2002 issue of
Winds of Change.
The Update that follows includes some of the exciting
career steps that he has taken since receiving his MPH in
2002.
Exploring New Frontiers
Dr. Dwayne Jarman was raised on a small farm south of Grand
Rapids, Michigan. Sharing his father’s love of animals,
young Dwayne helped care for the chickens, cattle, pigs,
and hunting dogs. On his school breaks, Dwayne, who was
considering a career as a veterinarian, accompanied Dr.
Chris Herring, a local veterinarian, on farm visits.
In the summer between his junior and senior year of high
school, Dwayne attended an enrichment program at Cornell
University where he worked as a veterinary technician. The
following summer he took part in the SUPER Program [Summer
University Program Excellence Required] at Michigan State
University, which he says gave him and others “a jump on
other students coming into college.”
Clearly, Dr.
Jarman demonstrated his potential for becoming a
veterinarian because that fall he entered the undergraduate
program at Michigan State University as a scholar in the
College of Veterinary Medicine. As a scholar, Dwayne was
guaranteed admission to the veterinary school as long as he
completed the school’s requirements and maintained a high
grade point average. During his undergraduate years, he
participated in the Vetward Bound Program and received
scholarship funding as a Native American Scholar.
In his sophomore year of college, Dwayne was a Native
American minority aide in the Office of Minority Student
Affairs. He and the rest of the team from that office tried
to help other students remain in college by providing
individual guidance, programs, newsletters, and other forms
of support. That year the Office of Supportive Service
proclaimed Dwayne “Sophomore of the Year” in part because
he maintained a high grade point average while being
actively involved in community service.
Within three years of entering college, Dwayne had
completed the coursework he needed for entering veterinary
school. That summer he participated in ESP III, the summer
enrichment program at the veterinary school at MSU, which
he describes as “a mock version of what veterinary school
is like.” He says, “ESP III is an excellent program for
Native students interested in veterinary medicine.”
During that summer program, Dwayne met both Dr. Lowrie, who
he says was “an awesome mentor” and Dr. John Kaneene, “a
world, renowned veterinarian epidemiologist”. Dwayne says,
“Dr. Kaneene told us about a family that had been exposed
to a bat with rabies. I was very interested in the way
problems like rabies can be transmitted from animals to
people. I realized that community/population medicine is a
fascinating field, and I wanted to pursue it further.”
Interested
in the Big Picture
The care of individual animals is a major focus of
veterinary school. Dwayne knew that it was important to
become competent in this area, so he worked hard at his
studies, but, he confesses, he was more interested in the
“big picture”. He wanted to become an infectious disease
veterinary epidemiologist and travel the world on outbreak
investigations.
For two summers during veterinary school Dwayne was able to
take some steps toward his dream. He went to Thailand as
part of a National Institute of Health Minority
International Research Training grant. “The first year we
tried to find enteric and blood parasitic infections in
horses and cattle located in the hills of Northern
Thailand,” he recalls. “During the second summer another
student and I looked at parasite problems in racing and
riding horses in Chiang Mai. This enabled one to compare
the parasite prevalence (burden) between the two groups of
horses.”
Although he enjoyed the experience in Thailand and felt
that he learned a lot, Dwayne knew that to do the best
possible work, he needed more skills in epidemiology and
other public and community health areas.
Building
Skills in Public Health
Following his graduation from veterinary school, Dwayne
entered the Master of Public Health program at the
University of Michigan. He did a year-long internship in
epidemiology with the Great Lakes Inter-Tribal Council in
Lac du Flambeau, Wisconsin. His project was developing,
piloting and administering a community health needs
assessment tool and then analyzing and reporting the survey
data to one tribal health department.
Gratitude for Support
Dwayne believes that what he has accomplished is not “extra
ordinary” He says, “There’s no way I could be in my present
position without the support and guidance of friends,
family, and advisors. I want students to know that with
work and persistence they can find themselves in a similar
position. They need someone who believes in them, and, most
of all, they need to believe in themselves.
This
article, written by Jane Westberg, was originally published
in the Autumn 2002 issue of
Winds of Change. (The cover
artist is Virginia Stroud, United Keetoowah Bank of
Cherokee Indians in Oklahoma.)
Update 2007
After earning his MPH in epidemiology in 2002, Dr. Jarman
was awarded an 8-week long James A. Ferguson Emerging
Infectious Disease Fellowship at the CDC. Minority graduate
students engage in a rigorous program of public health
research and/or intervention that they summarize at the end
of the session in a scientific presentation. Dwayne
developed and administered an infectious cause of disease
survey to appropriate CDC staff.
Next Dr. Jarman wanted to do a project that would benefit
his tribe. Serving as a health consultant to the Grand
Traverse Band of Ottawa and Chippewa Indians, Dwayne used
his new skills to design and administer a community health
and housing needs assessment. He analyzed the results and
gave this information to his tribe and tribal leaders so
they could use it in planning health care services and
tribal member housing needs.
In 2003, Dwayne returned to the Great Lakes Inter-Tribal
Council as an emergency preparedness coordinator. His main
job was helping tribes prepare for possible outbreaks of
disease or other public health emergencies. His
responsibilities included coordinating tribal preparedness
efforts with local, state and federal partners and
designing and implementing tribal and tribal/county
emergency exercises. One of his accomplishments was
coordinating two regional tribal emergency preparedness
conferences that focused on enhancing state, local, and
tribal collaboration. In his spare time, Dwayne promoted
veterinary services at tribes, and volunteered with the
Vilas County Humane Society, where he provided an at-cost
spray/neuter program for cats and dogs.
In 2004, while he was serving as an emergency preparedness
coordinator, Dwayne was selected to participate in the
Kellogg Management Fellowship for Emerging Leaders in
Public Health (ELPH), based at the University of North
Carolina in Chapel Hill. The fellowship included intensive
on-site workshops, personalized coaching, and participation
in action learning teams. Dwayne felt that the fellowship
improved his work place effectiveness and efficiency.
In 2005, the
CDC offered Dwayne one of the coveted positions as an
Epidemic Intelligence Service (EIS) officer. Only 60 to 80
people are selected from about 300 applications. Alumni of
this program have gone on to become some of the nation's
premier medical and public health leaders. Dwayne spent his
EIS training period at the North Dakota Department of
Health, concentrating on how to identify and measure public
health issues scientifically. He studied binge drinking in
relation to occupation and found that it was most prevalent
in food and drink
servers.(http://www.cdc.gov/pcd/issues/2007/oct/06_0152.htm)
When Hurricane Katrina ravaged New Orleans, Dwayne was one
of the first to volunteer to help. On his deployment, he
aided in a shelter surveillance system in Louisiana aiming
to identify the health needs of displaced persons; Dwayne
also helped implement a rapid community and mental health
needs assessment.
(http://www.cdc.gov/mmwr/preview/mmwrhtml/mm5502a5.htm)
Dr. Jarman says that the CDC Preventive Medicine Fellowship
Program emphasizes the development of leadership and
management skills through participation in supervised field
experience in a state or federal public health agency. As a
member of the CDC Alcohol Team, Dwayne is particularly
interested in learning about effective strategies for
preventing excessive drinking and seeing how these
strategies might be used to help reduce alcohol-related
harms among American Indians and Alaska Natives, including
alcohol-attributable deaths and injuries from vehicular
crashes and domestic violence.
After
his fellowship with CDC, Dwayne plans to relocate to
Montana with his family. Dr. Jarman is married to Kirsten
Matoy Carlson (Cherokee) who is completing her PhD in
political science and will join the Indian Law Resource
Center (http://www.indianlaw.org/) as a staff attorney this
fall. Together they have one daughter, Grace Walela Jarman.
While in Montana, Dwayne is confident that his experiences
will help him continue exploring new frontiers as he works
to help his people.