Public Health, Medicine professor nationally recognized for lifetime achievement in pioneering occupational medicine and public health curriculum at WVU

For more than 20 years, West Virginia University School of Public Health Professor and Program Director Christopher Martin, MD, has dedicated his career to education and research in occupational medicine at WVU. Now, he’s receiving national recognition for his lifetime achievements.

Offered to only one individual per year from the American College of Occupational and Environmental Medicine, the Excellence in Education or Research in Occupational and Environmental Medicine Award is given to those who have made significant contributions to academic excellence or research in occupational medicine, environmental medicine, and/or environmental health.

As the program director for the WVU Occupational Medicine Residency Program, Dr. Martin is one of the longest standing program directors in the nation. Nominated by colleagues for the prestigious award, he says the news came as a shock and surprise during his four-month sabbatical in Spain.

“As I looked at the list of recipients of ACOEM awards, I was humbled,” Martin said. “Never in my wildest dreams did I think I would be on the same list as these pioneers in the field.”

Recruited to lead the public health medical residency program, Martin came to WVU in 1999. During his tenure, he’s founded and directed the Global Engagement Office, taught residents as Health Sciences Center Professor of Medicine and Occupational Medicine, contributed to several peer-reviewed articles and spearheaded groundbreaking research.

Martin has continued to oversee the Occupational Medicine Residency Program for more than two decades. In 2018, he worked with colleagues to expand the existing occupational residency program and establish a new public health and general medicine residency thanks to a grant from the Health Resources and Services Administration (HRSA). As the principal investigator of both the HRSA grant and a training grant from National Institute for Occupational Safety and Health (NIOSH), he is responsible for pioneering the first and only Public Health-General Preventive Medicine residency in Appalachia.

According to Martin, public health and occupational medicine residencies are vital in rural areas like West Virginia—where there are higher rates of occupational disease than anywhere else in the country.

“Data show that about half of physicians remain in practice where they completed residency training, so it's important to have programs located in areas of need like ours,” said Martin. “Not only do we have physician shortage in this country, we also have a maldistribution, with fewer doctors in rural areas. Training our own public and occupational health physicians not only provides them with skillsets relevant to our underserved populations, but also helps to rectify this inequality.”

For those considering a future education in public health and occupational medicine at WVU, Martin offers strong words of encouragement and hope.

“Studies consistently show that burn-out rates are lowest for our specialty,” he said. “Our past graduates consistently tell us how satisfied they are doing what they do. In our field, I believe the potential to make a positive impact to improve the health of the populations we serve is greater than any other specialty in medicine.”

In addition to his roles as professor and progressor and program director, Martin is the founding director of WVU’s Global Engagement Office where he oversees international partnerships for all five schools within WVU’s Health Sciences Center. He has also been an active contributor to and fellow of ACOEM, having served on the Council on Scientific Affairs and teaching a board certification review course.

 

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