Dr. Clare Rock is an Associate Professor of Medicine in the Division of Infectious Diseases at Johns Hopkin University and is also an Associate Hospital Epidemiologist at Johns Hopkins Hospital. She is also core faculty at Armstrong Institute for Patient Safety and Quality. Dr. Rock is currently co-principal investigator of the Johns Hopkins CDC Preventions Epicenter grant, which uses innovative approaches to reduce healthcare associated infections and antimicrobial resistance. Her research focuses on reducing pathogen transmission in the healthcare setting. Dr. Rock served on the Society for Healthcare Epidemiology of America (SHEA) board of directors as an elected  councilor, is past chair of the SHEA Research Network, served on the SHEA Research Committee and currently serves on the board of director of the SHEA foundation committee. Dr. Rock is the Research Director for the High-Value Practice Academic Alliance. Dr. Rock and Dr. Leekha co-lead the SPARC academic partner teams.

Dr. Sara Cosgrove is a Professor of Medicine in the Division of Infectious Disease (ID) at Johns Hopkins University School of Medicine and has a joint appointment in the Department of Epidemiology at the Johns Hopkins Bloomberg School of Public Health. She is the Director of Research for the ID Fellowship Program and PI of the T32 training grant that supports ID fellow training. She serves as the Director of the Department of Antimicrobial Stewardship and the Associate Hospital Epidemiologist at The Johns Hopkins Hospital. Dr. Cosgrove’s research interests include the epidemiology and outcomes of antimicrobial resistance, the development of tools and programs to promote the rational use of antimicrobials, the prevention of hospital-acquired infections and the epidemiology and management of S. aureus bacteremia. Early in her career, she recognized the critical need to study antimicrobial stewardship strategies and has led a series of outcomes studies over the past 15 years that have defined the practice of antimicrobial stewardship in the United States. Her recent research focuses on strategies for implementation of antimicrobial stewardship activities across all healthcare settings via a large, multi-center project including hospitals, long-term care facilities and ambulatory practices funded by the Agency for Healthcare Research and Quality. She was a voting member of the Presidential Advisory Council on Combating Antibiotic-Resistant Bacteria from 2015-2022. She is a Past President of the Society for Healthcare Epidemiology’s Board of Directors.

Dr. Kate Dzintars is a clinical pharmacy specialist in Infectious Diseases and Antimicrobial Stewardship at The Johns Hopkins Hospital. She was a member of the CDAT (C. difficile Action Team) that involved case-specific teaching points and face-to-face feedback to optimize management of C. difficile infections and looks forward to using this information to assist in developing the principles set forth by the SPARC initiative.

Dr. Valeria Fabre is an Associate Professor of Medicine in the Division of Infectious Diseases at the Johns Hopkins University School of Medicine. She is also the Associate Medical Director of the Adult Antimicrobial Stewardship Program at the Johns Hopkins Hospital. Her research interests include the development of new strategies to promote optimal antibiotic use, and diagnostic stewardship, both nationally and internationally. She is a member of the Society for Healthcare Epidemiology of America (SHEA) and the Infectious Diseases Society of America (IDSA). She completed her residency in Internal Medicine at Brown University’s Memorial Hospital of Rhode Island and completed a fellowship in Infectious Diseases at the Johns Hopkins University School of Medicine.

Dr. Sara Keller is an Assistant Professor in infectious diseases at the Johns Hopkins University School of Medicine. Her research focuses on outpatient use of antimicrobial therapy and of outpatient central venous catheters. She also focuses on improving antibiotic stewardship in ambulatory settings and improving transitions in care among patients discharged on antibiotic therapy. In addition, Keller teaches others about quality improvement and implementation science.

Dr. Lisa Maragakis is a Professor of Medicine and Infectious Disease at the Johns Hopkins University School of Medicine. She serves as Senior Director for Healthcare Epidemiology and Infection Control of the Johns Hopkins Health System and as the Hospital Epidemiologist for the Johns Hopkins Hospital in Baltimore, Maryland. Dr. Maragakis’ research focuses on the prevention of healthcare-associated infections (HAI). She is the principal investigator for a national Methicillin-resistant Staphylococcus aureus (MRSA) Prevention Program funded and guided by the Agency for Healthcare Research and Quality and a co-investigator in the Johns Hopkins Prevention Epicenter funded by the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) Epicenters Program. She currently serves as the Chair of CDC’s Healthcare Infection Control Practices Advisory Committee (HICPAC) and as Co-Chair of the 2022 update of the SHEA-IDSA Compendium of Strategies to Prevent Healthcare-Associated Infections. She received her medical degree and completed her post-doctoral training in Infectious Diseases at the Johns Hopkins University School of Medicine and earned her MPH in Epidemiology from the Johns Hopkins University Bloomberg School of Public Health.

Dr. Aaron Milstone is a Professor of Pediatric Infectious Diseases and Epidemiology at the Johns Hopkins University School of Medicine. He is also an Associate Hospital Epidemiologist at the Johns Hopkins Hospital and the Pediatric Lead for Infection Prevention for the Johns Hopkins Health System. He serves on multiple national committees and writing groups guiding practices to prevent healthcare-associated infections (HAIs) and emergence of antibiotic resistance. For more than 15 years, he has worked to advance the science of infection control through studies of the prevalence and transmission of multidrug-resistant organisms (MDRO) and interventions to reduce MDRO spread and prevent HAIs. Dr. Milstone’s research program is funded by the National Institutes of Health, the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, and the Agency for Healthcare Research and Quality. As a pediatrician, he advocates for unique approaches to balance infection control and family-centered care.

Polly Trexler is the Director of Operations for Hospital Epidemiology and Infection Control at the Johns Hopkins Hospital and is the Director of Hospital Epidemiology and Infection Control for the Johns Hopkins Health System. She has over 25 years of experience in infection prevention and has worked in both community and academic settings. She is a past board member of the local Association for Professionals in Infection Control and Epidemiology (APIC) chapter and served on the national SHEA Guidelines Committee. She has taught infection prevention in the Johns Hopkins University School of Nursing, the Johns Hopkins University Bloomberg School of Public Health, and internationally. She has led numerous investigations related to outbreaks and clusters in hospital and ambulatory settings. Her research interests include hand hygiene and the role of the environment in infection transmission. She holds a Master’s degree in Microbiology and is Certified in Infection Control.

Dr. Tamma is an Associate Professor of Pediatrics and the Director of the Pediatric Antibiotic Stewardship Program at The Johns Hopkins University School of Medicine. She is also an Associate Professor in the Department of Epidemiology at The Johns Hopkins Bloomberg School of Public Health. Her research focuses on developing and enhancing rapid phenotypic and genotypic methods to identify gram-negative resistance to enable critically-ill patients to be placed on appropriate antibiotic therapy as early as possible and identifying optimal treatment strategies for patients infected with multidrug-resistant gram-negative infections. She had the opportunity to work in the national and international arena to advance including: serving as an Editor at Antimicrobial Agents and Chemotherapy and The Journal of the Pediatric Infectious Diseases Society; serving as 1 of 12 international voting members of the Clinical Laboratory and Standards Institute that provides international guidance on phenotypic and genotypic methods for identifying antimicrobial resistance; serving as a voting member of the NIH-funded Antibacterial Resistance Leadership Group Gram-Negative Resistance Committee; and serving as the Co-Chair for the Infectious Diseases Society of America Antimicrobial Resistance Guidance. She serves as an advisor to the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention and The Joint Commission on approaches to improving antibiotic stewardship in the United States healthcare facilities.

Rebecca (Becky) Perlmutter is the Healthcare Associated Infections Coordinator for the state of Maryland at the Maryland Department of Health. She led Maryland’s Emerging Infections Program’s C. difficile surveillance for 7 years and has worked with sepsis surveillance, Ebola response, healthcare-associated infections (HAI) prevalence surveys, outbreak investigations, monkeypox, and COVID response.  As one of the original members of the Statewide Prevention and Reduction of C. difficile (SPARC) Collaborative, she has been so pleased to watch this resource evolve to meet urgent needs in a rapidly changing public health landscape. Becky earned her MPH from the Johns Hopkins University Bloomberg School of Public Health and is certified in infection control.

Dr. David Blythe is a medical epidemiologist at the Maryland Department of Health (MDH). He is the Maryland State Epidemiologist and Director of the MDH Infectious Disease Epidemiology and Outbreak Response Bureau where he works on infectious disease surveillance, case and outbreak investigations, and a range of other infectious disease-related projects. He also serves as the Principal Investigator for the Maryland Emerging Infection Program. He is excited to be able to participate in SPARC.

Jamie Rubin is the Infection Prevention and Control Program Administrator in the Infectious Disease Epidemiology and Outbreak Response Bureau at the Maryland Department of Health. Jamie's background is in acute care infection prevention and is a former emergency department nurse.  Since joining Maryland Department of Health in 2020, Jamie's focus is preventing the spread of multidrug resistant organisms and emerging pathogens in healthcare facilities, and engaging infection prevention, public health, and industry partners in prevention activities across the state. Jamie earned her MS from the University of Maryland Baltimore School of Nursing and is board certified in Infection Control.

Surbhi Leekha MBBS, MPH, is an Infectious Diseases physician and Professor in the Department of Epidemiology and Public Health at University of Maryland School of Medicine. She is the Medical Director for Infection Prevention and Hospital Epidemiology at the University of Maryland Medical Center. Most of her professional effort is devoted to prevention of healthcare associated infections, with focus on surveillance methodology, implementation techniques, and infectious disease diagnostic stewardship.

Dr. Jacqueline Bork is an Infectious Diseases physician at the University of Maryland Medical Center, where she also serves as Medical Director of the Antimicrobial Stewardship Program. Her interests include implementing and assessing innovative interventions, such as rapid diagnostics and prescriber feedback and education, to improve antibiotic prescription in healthcare. Improving patient-related outcomes, such as C. difficile infections, is the main objective of her work.

Dr. Kimberly Claeys is an Associate Professor at the University of Maryland School of Pharmacy and specializes in infectious diseases. She is also an Antimicrobial Stewardship Pharmacist at the University of Maryland Medical Center and Co-Chair of the UMMS System Sepsis Rapid Diagnostic Testing Working Group. She is currently earning a PhD in Epidemiology at the University of Maryland School of Medicine with a focus on diagnostic stewardship and is a 2022/2023 National Academy of Medicine Scholar in Diagnostic Excellence.

Dr. Anthony Harris is an infectious disease physician and epidemiologist whose research interests include emerging pathogens, antimicrobial-resistant bacteria, hospital epidemiology/infection control, epidemiologic methods in infectious diseases, and medical informatics. He has published over 280 papers. He has received funding from the NIH, CDC and AHRQ to study antibiotic resistance and hospital epidemiology. Dr. Harris served as the President of the Society for Healthcare Epidemiology of America (SHEA) in 2015. He completed his medical training at the McGill University Faculty of Medicine.

Emily Heil is an Associate Professor in the Department of Pharmacy Practice and Science at the University of Maryland School of Pharmacy. She also serves as the Pharmacy Director of the Antimicrobial Stewardship Program at the University of Maryland Medical Center. She earned her PharmD at the University of North Carolina, Chapel Hill and subsequently completed her pharmacy practice and infectious diseases pharmacy residency training at the University of North Carolina Hospitals. She completed her Master of Science in Clinical Research and Epidemiology at the University of Maryland, Baltimore. Her research interests include antibiotic allergies, antimicrobial stewardship, and the individualization of antimicrobial dosing, particularly in critically ill patients. She has collaborated with many SPARC team members on C. difficile reduction and other antimicrobial stewardship initiatives both at her home institution as well as other hospitals across the state.

L. Leigh Smith, MD is currently a Visiting Assistant Professor in the Department of Epidemiology and Public Health at the University of Maryland School of Medicine.  She is also currently a LEAP CDC Fellow and recently completed her fellowship in Infectious Diseases at the Johns Hopkins Hospital.  She has helped to facilitate many investigations into outbreaks and clusters of infection. Dr. Smith’s research focuses on quality improvement and preventing the transmission of infectious diseases in the hospital and community setting.

Dr. Coffey is an Infectious Disease physician and Associate Hospital Epidemiologist at the Veterans Affairs (VA) Maryland Healthcare System. She is also an Assistant Professor in the Division of Genomic Epidemiology and Clinical Outcomes within the Department of Epidemiology and Public Health at the University of Maryland School of Medicine. Dr. Coffey is board certified in Medical Microbiology as well as Infectious Diseases and Internal Medicine. Her interests include: diagnostic stewardship, antibiotic stewardship, and prevention of healthcare associated infections.

Dr. Prashila Dullabh, MD is a Senior Fellow at NORC at the University of the Chicago. She is the co-Investigator of the AHRQ Safety Program for Improving Antibiotic Use study. Dullabh is a clinician with more than 15 years of experience in healthcare and health services research. Dullabh has led several technical assistance, evaluation, and strategic projects for federal agencies and foundations. Recently her work has focused on patient safety interventions in ambulatory and inpatient care related to community-acquired pneumonia, opioid prescribing, and hospital-acquired conditions. Dullabh has also been extensively involved with projects focused on patient-centered outcomes research. She has directed projects for the Patient-Centered Outcomes Research Institute (PCORI), assessing research for implementation in clinical settings to improve health systems. She recently completed a PCORI systematic review of antibiotic stewardship interventions for acute care.

Priyanka Desai, PhD, MSPH, CPH is a Research Scientist with NORC. Dr. Desai has a decade of experience in health services research including conducting systematic literature reviews, programmatic assessments, and qualitative research. She has a strong background in stakeholder engagement and has co-authored a framework for stakeholder engagement in comparative effectiveness research. Dr. Desai currently supports several projects focused on patient-centered outcomes research, providing technical assistance, conducting evaluations, and implementing dissemination activities. Prior to joining NORC, Dr. Desai was a Research Assistant with the Minnesota Evidence-based Practice Center where she co-authored systematic literature reviews to inform the development of educational materials and tools, clinical practice guidelines, and research priorities.