Rita Hamad, MD, PhD
Associate Professor
Institute for Health Policy Studies
School of Medicine

She is a social epidemiologist and family physician, and the Director of the Social Policies for Health Equity Research Center (https://www.hsph.harvard.edu/sphere/).

Dr. Hamad's research focuses on the pathways linking social factors like poverty and education with racial and socioeconomic disparities in health across the life course. In particular, she studies the health effects of social and economic policies using interdisciplinary quasi-experimental methods to generate actionable evidence to inform policymaking. She was the Associate Director of the UCSF Center for Health Equity. She was also a member of the steering committee of the UCSF Population Health Data Initiative, serving as the Faculty Lead for the development of data infrastructure to advance population health research on campus.

Outside of her academic role, Dr. Hamad is the co-Chair of the Communications Committee of the Interdisciplinary Association for Population Health Science and serves as an Associate Editor for the journal Health Affairs Scholar. In 2020-2022, she was also a Fellow at the National Academy of Medicine. She has provided consultation to federal and state legislators on the design of poverty alleviation policies. Dr. Hamad mentors trainees at all levels in population health and health equity research, and lectures in several courses about the effects of social policies on health inequities. She saw patients for 10 years in safety net clinics throughout the San Francisco Bay Area, although she is no longer a practicing physician.

• Reducing Intergenerational Poverty-An Essential Driver of Health.
  JAMA pediatrics 2024 Hamad R, Addo F, Montez K
• Immigrants to the United States contribute to society: Here are 3 ways to support their transition.
  Health affairs scholar 2024 Hamad R
• Factors associated with anxiety during the first two years of the COVID-19 pandemic in the United States: An analysis of the COVID-19 Citizen Science study.
  PloS one 2024 Cozen AE, Carton T, Hamad R, Kornak J, Faulkner Modrow M, Peyser ND, Park S, Orozco JH, Brandner M, O'Brien EC, Djibo DA, McMahill-Walraven CN, Isasi CR, Beatty AL, Olgin JE, Marcus GM, Pletcher MJ
• Understanding multi-program take-up of safety net programs among California families.
  AJPM Focus 2024 Marisa M. Tsai, Joseph Yeb, Kaitlyn Jackson, Wendi Gosliner, Lia C.H. Fernald, Rita Hamad
• Medicaid Expansion and Perinatal Health Outcomes: A Quasi-Experimental Study.
  Maternal and child health journal 2024 Modrek S, Collin DF, Hamad R, White JS
• The association of safety net program participation with government perceptions, welfare stigma, and discrimination.
  2023 Richard Pulvera, Kaitlyn Jackson, Wendi Gosliner, Rita Hamad, Lia Fernald
• Estimating the effect of timing of earned income tax credit refunds on perinatal outcomes: a quasi-experimental study of California births.
  BMC public health 2023 Karasek D, Batra A, Baer RJ, Butcher BDC, Feuer S, Fuchs JD, Kuppermann M, Gomez AM, Prather AA, Pantell M, Rogers E, Snowden JM, Torres J, Rand L, Jelliffe-Pawlowski L, Hamad R
• The association of neighborhood socioeconomic characteristics with cardiovascular health: A quasi-experimental study of refugees to Denmark.
  Health & place 2023 Jensen NK, Frøslev T, Foverskov E, Glymour M, Sørensen HT, Hamad R
• Promoting health equity through poverty alleviation policy: Factors associated with receipt of the 2021 U.S. Child Tax Credit in a nationwide sample.
  Preventive medicine 2023 Chiang AY, Batra A, Hamad R
• Testing mediating pathways between school segregation and health: Evidence on peer prejudice and health behaviors.
  Social science & medicine (1982) 2023 Schwartz GL, Chiang AY, Wang G, Kim MH, White JS, Hamad R
• Associations of U.S. state-level COVID-19 policies intensity with cannabis sharing behaviors in 2020.
  Research square 2023 Assaf RD, Hamad R, Javanbakht M, Arah OA, Shoptaw SJ, Cooper ZD, Gorbach PM
• Comparing the health of refugee and asylee patients with that of non-refugee immigrant and US-born patients in a large Urban clinic.
  BMC public health 2023 Raphael E, Barton M, Jaradeh K, Dieterich C, Hamad R
• Potential mechanisms linking poverty alleviation and health: an analysis of benefit spending among recipients of the U.S. earned income tax credit.
  BMC public health 2023 Hamad R, Yeb J, Jackson K, Gosliner W, Fernald LCH
• Ten health policy challenges for the next 10 years.
  2023 Kathryn A Phillips, Deborah A Marshall, Loren Adler, Jose Figueroa, Simon F Haeder, Rita Hamad, Inmaculada Hernandez, Corrina Moucheraud, Sayeh Nikpay
• Experiences of distress and gaps in government safety net supports among parents of young children during the COVID-19 pandemic: a qualitative study.
  BMC public health 2023 Mooney AC, Jackson KE, Hamad R, Fernald LCH, Hoskote M, Gosliner W
• Understanding the Predictors of Low Take-Up of the Special Supplemental Nutrition Program for Women, Infants, and Children (WIC): A Nationwide Longitudinal Study.
  Maternal and child health journal 2023 Guan A, Batra A, Seligman H, Hamad R
• The Pent-Up Demand for Breastfeeding Among US Women: Trends After COVID-19 Shelter-in-Place.
  American journal of public health 2023 Hamad R, Collin DF, Gemmill A, Jackson K, Karasek D
• Predictors of WIC uptake among low-income pregnant individuals: a longitudinal nationwide analysis.
  The American journal of clinical nutrition 2023 Collin DF, Guan A, Hamad R
• Sugar-Sweetened Beverage Taxes and Perinatal Health: A Quasi-Experimental Study.
  American journal of preventive medicine 2023 Jackson KE, Hamad R, Karasek D, White JS
• Racial and sociodemographic predictors of COVID-19 compared with influenza, appendicitis, and all-cause hospitalization: retrospective cohort analysis.
  Ethnicity & health 2023 Raphael E, Azar KMJ, Gu D, Shen Z, Rubinsky A, Wang M, Pantell M, Lyles CR, Fernandez A, Bibbins-Domingo K, Pressman A, Nasrallah C, Hamad R
• The effect of the 2009 revised U.S. guidelines for gestational weight gain on maternal and infant health: a quasi-experimental study.
  BMC pregnancy and childbirth 2023 Collin DF, Pulvera R, Hamad R
• Unreported SARS-CoV-2 Home Testing and Test Positivity.
  JAMA network open 2023 Park S, Marcus GM, Olgin JE, Carton T, Hamad R, Pletcher MJ, COVID-19 Citizen Science Study Consortium
• Neighborhood disadvantage and the risk of dementia and mortality among refugees to Denmark: A quasi-experimental study.
  SSM - population health 2022 Kim MH, Foverskov E, Frøslev T, White JS, Glymour MM, Hainmueller J, Pedersen L, Sørensen HT, Hamad R
• Understanding Take-Up Of The Earned Income Tax Credit Among Californians With Low Income.
  Health affairs (Project Hope) 2022 Hamad R, Gosliner W, Brown EM, Hoskote M, Jackson K, Esparza EM, Fernald LCH
• Impact of fruit and vegetable benefits on pregnancy outcomes among WIC participants: a natural experiment.
  Translational behavioral medicine 2022 Wang G, Seligman H, Levi R, Hamad R
• Effects of the revised WIC food package on women's and children's health: a quasi-experimental study.
  BMC pregnancy and childbirth 2022 Guan A, Batra A, Hamad R
• Risk of Psychiatric Disorders Among Refugee Children and Adolescents Living in Disadvantaged Neighborhoods.
  JAMA pediatrics 2022 Foverskov E, White JS, Frøslev T, Sørensen HT, Hamad R
• Pandemic-related socioeconomic disruptions and adverse health outcomes: a cross-sectional study of female caregivers.
  BMC public health 2022 Brown EM, Fernald LCH, Hamad R, Hoskote M, Jackson KE, Gosliner W
• The U.S. COVID-19 County Policy Database: a novel resource to support pandemic-related research.
  BMC public health 2022 Hamad R, Lyman KA, Lin F, Modrow MF, Ozluk P, Azar KMJ, Goodin A, Isasi CR, Kitzman HE, Knight SJ, Marcus GM, McMahill-Walraven CN, Meissner P, Nair V, O'Brien EC, Olgin JE, Peyser ND, Sylwestrzak G, …
• The association of residential racial segregation with health among U.S. children: A nationwide longitudinal study.
  SSM - population health 2022 Wang G, Schwartz GL, Kershaw KN, McGowan C, Kim MH, Hamad R
• Evaluating the Effect of San Francisco's Paid Parental Leave Ordinance on Birth Outcomes.
  International journal of environmental research and public health 2022 Karasek D, Raifman S, Dow WH, Hamad R, Goodman JM
• The long shadow of residential racial segregation: Associations between childhood residential segregation trajectories and young adult health among Black US Americans.
  Health & place 2022 Schwartz GL, Wang G, Kershaw KN, McGowan C, Kim MH, Hamad R
• The Deferred Action for Childhood Arrivals program and birth outcomes in California: a quasi-experimental study.
  BMC public health 2022 Torres JM, Alcala E, Shaver A, Collin DF, Franck LS, Gomez AM, Karasek D, Nidey N, Hotard M, Hamad R, Pacheco-Werner T
• The effect of the 2009 WIC revision on maternal and child health: A quasi-experimental study.
  Paediatric and perinatal epidemiology 2022 Pulvera R, Collin DF, Hamad R
• The Role of Health Care Systems in Bolstering the Social Safety Net to Address Health Inequities in the Wake of the COVID-19 Pandemic.
  JAMA 2022 Hamad R, Galea S
• School racial segregation and long-term cardiovascular health among Black adults in the US: A quasi-experimental study.
  PLoS medicine 2022 Kim MH, Schwartz GL, White JS, Glymour MM, Reardon SF, Kershaw KN, Gomez SL, Collin DF, Inamdar PP, Wang G, Hamad R
• Neighbourhood socioeconomic disadvantage and psychiatric disorders among refugees: a population-based, quasi-experimental study in Denmark.
  Social psychiatry and psychiatric epidemiology 2022 Foverskov E, White JS, Norredam M, Frøslev T, Kim MH, Glymour MM, Pedersen L, Sørensen HT, Hamad R
• Characterizing the Landscape of Safety Net Programs and Policies in California during the COVID-19 Pandemic.
  International journal of environmental research and public health 2022 Jackson KE, Yeb J, Gosliner W, Fernald LCH, Hamad R
• Leveraging the Urgency of Economic Disparities Driven by the COVID-19 Pandemic to Strengthen the U.S. Safety Net.
  NAM perspectives 2022 Hamad R, Ruffini K, Bitler M, Currie J
• Explaining the Variance in Cardiovascular Disease Risk Factors: A Comparison of Demographic, Socioeconomic, and Genetic Predictors.
  Epidemiology (Cambridge, Mass.) 2022 Hamad R, Glymour MM, Calmasini C, Nguyen TT, Walter S, Rehkopf DH
• Social and Economic Factors Related to Healthcare Delay Among Low-Income Families During COVID-19: Results from the ACCESS Observational Study.
  Journal of health care for the poor and underserved 2022 Hoskote M, Hamad R, Gosliner W, Sokal-Gutierrez K, Dow W, Fernald LCH
• Paid Leave Policies Can Help Keep Businesses Open And Food On Workers’ Tables
  Health Affairs Blog 2021 Raifman JR, Raderman W, Skinner A, Hamad R
• Moving Upstream: The Importance of Examining Policies to Address Health Disparities.
  JAMA pediatrics 2021 Seligman HK, Hamad R
• How does income affect mental health and health behaviours? A quasi-experimental study of the earned income tax credit.
  Journal of epidemiology and community health 2021 Shields-Zeeman L, Collin DF, Batra A, Hamad R
• The effects of state earned income tax credits on mental health and health behaviors: A quasi-experimental study.
  Social science & medicine (1982) 2021 Collin DF, Shields-Zeeman LS, Batra A, White JS, Tong M, Hamad R
• Short-term effects of the earned income tax credit on children's physical and mental health.
  Annals of epidemiology 2021 Batra A, Hamad R
• The Revised WIC Food Package and Child Development: A Quasi-Experimental Study.
  Pediatrics 2021 Guan A, Hamad R, Batra A, Bush NR, Tylavsky FA, LeWinn KZ
• Association of US state policy orientation with adverse birth outcomes: a longitudinal analysis.
  Journal of epidemiology and community health 2021 Riley AR, Collin D, Grumbach JM, Torres JM, Hamad R
• Identifying Novel Predictors of State Legislative Action to Address Obesity.
  Journal of public health management and practice : JPHMP 2021 Arons A, Pomeranz J, Hamad R
• Natural and Unnatural Experiments in Epidemiology.
  Epidemiology (Cambridge, Mass.) 2020 Hamad R
• Association of Neighborhood Disadvantage With Cardiovascular Risk Factors and Events Among Refugees in Denmark.
  JAMA network open 2020 Hamad R, Öztürk B, Foverskov E, Pedersen L, Sørensen HT, Bøtker HE, White JS
• Association of Low Socioeconomic Status With Premature Coronary Heart Disease in US Adults.
  JAMA cardiology 2020 Hamad R, Penko J, Kazi DS, Coxson P, Guzman D, Wei PC, Mason A, Wang EA, Goldman L, Fiscella K, Bibbins-Domingo K
• Short-term effects of the earned income tax credit on mental health and health behaviors.
  Preventive medicine 2020 Collin DF, Shields-Zeeman LS, Batra A, Vable AM, Rehkopf DH, Machen L, Hamad R
• Geographic and Longitudinal Trends in Media Framing of Obesity in the United States.
  Obesity (Silver Spring, Md.) 2020 Chiang J, Arons A, Pomeranz JL, Siddiqi A, Hamad R
• Neighborhood Deprivation and Mental Health Among Immigrants to Sweden.
  Epidemiology (Cambridge, Mass.) 2020 Raphael E, White JS, Li X, Cederin K, Glymour MM, Sundquist K, Sundquist J, Hamad R
• The effect of California's paid family leave policy on parent health: A quasi-experimental study.
  Social science & medicine (1982) 2020 Lee BC, Modrek S, White JS, Batra A, Collin DF, Hamad R
• Cross-sectional analysis of place-based and racial disparities in hospitalisation rates by disease category in California in 2001 and 2011.
  BMJ open 2019 Raphael E, Gaynes R, Hamad R
• The short-term effects of the earned income tax credit on health care expenditures among US adults.
  Health services research 2019 Hamad R, Niedzwiecki MJ
• Disentangling the Effects of Socioeconomic Factors on Outcomes Among Patients With Heart Failure.
  JACC. Heart failure 2019 Hlatky MA, Hamad R
• The Impact of the Revised WIC Food Package on Maternal Nutrition During Pregnancy and Postpartum.
  American journal of epidemiology 2019 Hamad R, Batra A, Karasek D, LeWinn KZ, Bush NR, Davis RL, Tylavsky FA
• Educational attainment and cardiovascular disease in the United States: A quasi-experimental instrumental variables analysis.
  PLoS medicine 2019 Hamad R, Nguyen TT, Bhattacharya J, Glymour MM, Rehkopf DH
• Quality and quantity: The association of state-level educational policies with later life cardiovascular disease.
  Preventive medicine 2019 Hamad R, Nguyen TT, Glymour MM, Vable A, Manly JJ, Rehkopf DH
• Differential associations between state-level educational quality and cardiovascular health by race: Early-life exposures and late-life health.
  SSM - population health 2019 Vable AM, Nguyen TT, Rehkopf D, Glymour MM, Hamad R
• The association of county-level socioeconomic factors with individual tobacco and alcohol use: a longitudinal study of U.S. adults.
  BMC public health 2019 Hamad R, Brown DM, Basu S
• Comparing demographic and health characteristics of new and existing SNAP recipients: application of a machine learning algorithm.
  The American journal of clinical nutrition 2019 Hamad R, Templeton ZS, Schoemaker L, Zhao M, Bhattacharya J
• Estimating the Short-Term Effects of the Earned Income Tax Credit on Child Health.
  American journal of epidemiology 2018 Hamad R, Collin DF, Rehkopf DH
• Paid Family Leave Effects on Breastfeeding: A Quasi-Experimental Study of US Policies.
  American journal of public health 2018 Hamad R, Modrek S, White JS
• Mother's education and late-life disparities in memory and dementia risk among US military veterans and non-veterans.
  Journal of epidemiology and community health 2018 Vable AM, Eng CW, Mayeda ER, Basu S, Marden JR, Hamad R, Glymour MM
• How and why studies disagree about the effects of education on health: A systematic review and meta-analysis of studies of compulsory schooling laws.
  Social science & medicine (1982) 2018 Hamad R, Elser H, Tran DC, Rehkopf DH, Goodman SN
• Causal Thinking as a Critical Tool for Eliminating Social Inequalities in Health.
  American journal of public health 2018 Glymour MM, Hamad R
• Consolidated state political party control and the enactment of obesity-related policies in the United States.
  Preventive medicine 2017 Pomeranz JL, Siddiqi A, Bolanos GJ, Shor JA, Hamad R
• Predicting later life health status and mortality using state-level socioeconomic characteristics in early life.
  SSM - population health 2016 Hamad R, Rehkopf DH, Kuan KY, Cullen MR
• Racial and Socioeconomic Variation in Genetic Markers of Telomere Length: A Cross-Sectional Study of U.S. Older Adults.
  EBioMedicine 2016 Hamad R, Tuljapurkar S, Rehkopf DH
• Telomere length and health outcomes: A two-sample genetic instrumental variables analysis.
  Experimental gerontology 2016 Hamad R, Walter S, Rehkopf DH
• Changing national guidelines is not enough: the impact of 1990 IOM recommendations on gestational weight gain among US women.
  International journal of obesity (2005) 2016 Hamad R, Cohen AK, Rehkopf DH
• Long-term effects of neighbourhood deprivation on diabetes risk: quasi-experimental evidence from a refugee dispersal policy in Sweden.
  The lancet. Diabetes & endocrinology 2016 White JS, Hamad R, Li X, Basu S, Ohlsson H, Sundquist J, Sundquist K
• Hamad and Rehkopf Respond to "Income and Health: Financial Credits as Instruments".
  American journal of epidemiology 2016 Hamad R, Rehkopf DH
• Poverty and Child Development: A Longitudinal Study of the Impact of the Earned Income Tax Credit.
  American journal of epidemiology 2016 Hamad R, Rehkopf DH
• The EARN-Health Trial: protocol for a randomised controlled trial to identify health effects of a financial savings programme among low-income US adults.
  BMJ open 2015 Basu S, Hamad R, White JS, Modrek S, Rehkopf DH, Cullen MR
• The Effects of Job Insecurity on Health Care Utilization: Findings from a Panel of U.S. Workers.
  Health services research 2015 Hamad R, Modrek S, Cullen MR
• Microcredit participation and women's health: results from a cross-sectional study in Peru.
  International journal for equity in health 2015 Hamad R, Fernald LC
• Poverty, Pregnancy, and Birth Outcomes: A Study of the Earned Income Tax Credit.
  Paediatric and perinatal epidemiology 2015 Hamad R, Rehkopf DH
• Using "big data" to capture overall health status: properties and predictive value of a claims-based health risk score.
  PloS one 2015 Hamad R, Modrek S, Kubo J, Goldstein BA, Cullen MR
• Psychological well-being during the great recession: changes in mental health care utilization in an occupational cohort.
  American journal of public health 2015 Modrek S, Hamad R, Cullen MR
• Large-scale automated analysis of news media: a novel computational method for obesity policy research.
  Obesity (Silver Spring, Md.) 2014 Hamad R, Pomeranz JL, Siddiqi A, Basu S
• Microcredit participation and child health: results from a cross-sectional study in Peru.
  Journal of epidemiology and community health 2014 Moseson H, Hamad R, Fernald L
• Health education for microcredit clients in Peru: a randomized controlled trial.
  BMC public health 2011 Hamad R, Fernald LCh, Karlan DS
• Microcredit participation and nutrition outcomes among women in Peru.
  Journal of epidemiology and community health 2010 Hamad R, Fernald LC
• Small individual loans and mental health: a randomized controlled trial among South African adults.
  BMC public health 2008 Fernald LC, Hamad R, Karlan D, Ozer EJ, Zinman J
• Social and economic correlates of depressive symptoms and perceived stress in South African adults.
  Journal of epidemiology and community health 2008 Hamad R, Fernald LC, Karlan DS, Zinman J