The Editorial Board of Women’s Health Issues is pleased to announce that the Charles E. Gibbs Leadership Prize for the best paper published in Women's Health Issues in 2024 (Volume 34) has been awarded to Monica H. Keith, PhD, an Assistant Professor in the Department of Anthropology and Director/Principal Investigator of the the Anthropological Health & Data Science (AHDS) Lab at Vanderbilt University. Her article, “Social Determinant Pathways to Hypertensive Disorders of Pregnancy Among Nulliparous U.S. Women,” was co-authored by Melanie A. Martin, PhD. It was published in Women’s Health Issues Volume 34, Issue 1 (January/February 2024).
Keith and Martin used data from the Nulliparous Pregnancy Outcomes Study: Monitoring Mothers-to-Be, which enrolled nulliparous pregnant participants from 17 clinical sites in eight regions across the United States and surveyed them in all three trimesters and at birth. The dataset included information on several aspects of the social environment — household income, number of people living in the household, marital status, educational attainment, and partners’ educational attainment — as well as on hypertensive conditions of pregnancy such as preeclampsia and markers of allostatic load (the cumulative effects of stress experienced across the life course) such as blood pressure. Keith and Martin developed a structural equation model linking latent social determinants of health, longitudinal markers of allostatic load across gestation, and hypertensive pregnancy outcomes in a multigroup framework.
The authors found that non-Hispanic Black participants had higher rates of hypertensive disorders of pregnancy than non-Hispanic white participants, and results for both groups showed that the social environment had a stronger direct effect on allostatic markers than behaviors such as diet, exercise, and smoking did. “This analysis underscores that sociostructural inequalities are more influential than individual behaviors in perpetuating racialized health disparities and that embodied stress is a major pathway to disparate maternal morbidity outcomes,” Keith and Martin wrote.
“Our editorial board appreciated this study because it not only addresses a condition that plays a critical role in maternal morbidity and mortality; it also presents a useful framework and elucidates how social determinants can actually influence hypertensive disorders of pregnancy,” said Karen McDonnell, Editor-in-Chief of Women’s Health Issues. “This kind of rigorous research can help inform interventions that address aspects of the social environment in order to improve maternal health.”
Out of the 68 research articles published in Women’s Health Issues in 2024, 56 were eligible for prize consideration because they did not have editorial board members as authors. The Editorial Board also designated four of the eligible 2024 manuscripts to receive “Honorable Mention” recognition:
- “Characteristics of U.S. Abortion Patients Who Obtained Care Out of State Prior to the Overturning of Roe v. Wade” by Sarah M. Axelson, MSW, Riley J. Steiner, PhD, MPH, and Rachel K. Jones, PhD. Published in Volume 34, Issue 2 (March/April 2024).
- “Effects of Georgia's Medicaid Family Planning Waiver on Pregnancy Characteristics and Birth Outcomes” by Gery P. Guy Jr., PhD, MPH, E. Kathleen Adams, PhD, MS, Sara K. Redd, PhD, MSPH, and Anne L. Dunlop, MD, MPH. Published in Volume 34, Issue 2 (March/April 2024).
- “Health Insurance Coverage and Access to Indian Health Service Care Before, During, and After Childbirth among American Indian and Alaska Native People in the United States” by Jessica L Liddell, Ph.D., MPH/MSW, Julia D Interrante, PhD, MPH, Emily C Sheffield, MPH, Hailey A. Baker, BS, and Katy B. Kozhimannil, PhD, MPA. Published in Volume 34, Issue 6 (November/December 2024).
- “Neighborhood Racialized Economic Polarization, Home Visiting Coverage, and Adverse Birth Outcomes in a Medicaid-eligible Population” by Xiao Yu, PhD, Lee Anne Roman, MSN, PhD, RN, Jennifer E. Raffo, MA, Ran Meng, MS, Peggy Vander Meulen, MSN, Celeste Sanchez Lloyd, MA, and Cristian I. Meghea, PhD. Published in Volume 34, Issue 4 (July/August 2024).
The Charles E. Gibbs Leadership Prize is awarded annually to recognize excellence in research on women’s health care or policy. Priority is given to manuscripts that report the results of original research and that improve understanding of an important women’s health issue. Members of the staff and Editorial Board of Women’s Health Issues are not eligible.
Previous winners of the Gibbs Prize are:
Godwin K. Osei-Poku, MD, DrPH (2023)
Sarah A. White, MSPH (2023)
Sara K. Redd, PhD, MSPH (2022)
Anu Manchikanti Gomez, PhD, MSc (2021)
Willi Horner-Johnson, PhD (2021)
Erica L. Eliason, MPH (2020)
Sarah C.M. Roberts, DrPH (2019)
Emily M. Johnston, PhD (2018)
Soumitra S. Bhuyan, PhD, MPH (2017)
Maeve Ellen Wallace, PhD (2017)
Aimee Kroll-Desrosiers, MS (2016)
Miao Jiang, PhD (2015)
Hailee K. Dunn, MPH (2014)
Cynthia LeardMann, MPH (2013)
Nathan L. Hale, PhD (2012)
Jacqueline L. Angel, PhD (2011)
Diana Greene Foster, PhD (2010)
Paula Lantz, PhD (2009)
Sherry Glied, PhD (2008)
Richard C. Lindrooth, PhD (2007)
Joan S. Tucker, PhD (2006)
JiWon R. Lee, MS, RD, MPH (2005)
Dawn M. Upchurch, PhD (2004)
Sherry L. Grace, PhD (2003)
Sarah Hudson Scholle, DrPH (2002)
Sandra K. Pope, PhD (2001)
Ilene Hyman, PhD (2000)
Usha Sambamaoorthi, PhD (1999)
Claire Murphy, MD (1997)
Barbara A. Bartman, MD, MPH (1996)
The Charles E. Gibbs Leadership Prize was established to honor the founding President of the Board of Governors of the Jacobs Institute of Women’s Health. Charles E. Gibbs, MD (1923–2000) was a Fellow of the American Congress of Obstetricians and Gynecologists (ACOG) and past chair of ACOG’s Committee on Health Care for Underserved Women, the Task Force on the Voluntary Review of Quality of Care, the Health Care Commission, and the Task Force on Maternal Health Policy. Dr. Gibbs served on the Jacobs Institute of Women’s Health Board of Governors from 1990–1999 and was instrumental in shaping the Institute’s mission and structure.