Mark Siedner
Dr. Mark Siedner is an infectious diseases specialist and clinical epidemiologist. His clinical and research work is focused on decreasing the burden of infectious diseases on health and quality of life in sub-Saharan Africa. His group uses a mix of implementation science clinical trials and longitudinal cohort studies to address many of the most pressing public health priorities in the region. He is a member of AHRI faculty, and holds the titles of associate professor of medicine at Harvard Medical School, physician at Massachusetts General Hospital and honorary associate professor of medicine at the University of KwaZulu-Natal.
Mark also has a passion for building research capacity among trainees on both sides of the Atlantic Ocean. He serves as the primary mentor to dozens of medical students, medical trainees and junior faculty, and was humbled to be awarded a Harvard Medical School Young Mentor Award in recognition for these activities. He dedicates significant time to didactics, both as a teaching clinician on the medical wards and through formal leadership on research methods, and serves as a co-PI for two US National Institutes of Health research training grants based in the US and in sub-Saharan Africa.
Get in touch with Mark via mark.siedner@ahri.org
Click here for a full list of publications.
Siedner group
The Siedner group
Dr. Siedner’s research programme focuses on the intersection between population health and clinical research, and is aimed at combatting the causes of morbidity and mortality among people living with HIV in low-income countries.
His active research projects include:
- Directing a longitudinal study of older people with and without and HIV to understand how HIV contributes to chronic diseases and aging
- Leading randomised clinical trials to assess the implementation of care improvement measures in the public sector, such as the addition of resistance testing to routine care for people failing HIV therapy and adopting a community-based model of care for people with uncontrolled hypertension in rural KwaZulu-Natal
- Leveraging the AHRI population health cohort and Vukuzazi research program to describe and respond to the most significant health needs of people in KwaZulu-Natal
Mark’s overarching goals at AHRI are to help strengthen the clinical research programme through 1) study of the intersecting infectious and non-communicable disease epidemics in rural South Africa, 2) a commitment to local capacity building; and 3) promotion of innovative, cross-disciplinary research between AHRI’s population and basic science programmes.
Meet the Team
Alison Castle
External collaborator
Alison is a current Fogarty global health scholar and infectious disease fellow at Massachusetts General Hospital. Her clinical research focuses on the intersection of infectious and non-communicable diseases. More specifically, she will explore the bidirectional relationship between tuberculosis, diabetes, and other comorbidities within an HIV-endemic cohort.
Thabang Manyaapelo
Research associate
Thabang Manyaapelo is a social scientist with rich research experience that spans multiple public health topics; including youth risky behaviours, HIV prevention, non-communicable diseases, maternal and child morbidity and mortality. His areas of interest are research methodology, human behaviour and the psychosocial determinants of health. Currently, Thabang is serving as the senior social scientist on the US NIH-funded IMPACT-BP trial that is evaluating the feasibility, effectiveness, and cost-effectiveness of community health worker-based hypertension care in rural KwaZulu-Natal.
Smart Mabweazara
Postdoctoral fellow
Smart Mabweazara earned his PhD from the University of the Western Cape. His research is focused on the promotion of physical activity among people living with HIV for prevention and management of non-communicable diseases. Smart’s work seeks to understand the role of physical activity in improving cardiometabolic health and developing, testing and evaluating physical activity interventions to improve cardiometabolic health amongst people living with HIV in underserved communities.
Nsika Sithole
PhD student & project manager
Nsika Sithole's PhD research explores antiretroviral prescription duplications at public health clinics and the ethics surrounding health workers accessing medical records from different health facilities. Nsika is an Oxford Population Health (Ethox) fellow and is also the project manager of AHRI's IMPACT BP clinical trial.
Selected Recent Publications
Siedner, M. J. (2017). Aging, Health, and Quality of Life for Older People Living With HIV in Sub-Saharan Africa: A Review and Proposed Conceptual Framework. Journal of Aging and Health, 089826431772454.
Siedner, M. J., Bwana, M. B., Moosa, M.-Y. S., Paul, M., Pillay, S., McCluskey, S., … Marconi, V. C. (2017). The REVAMP trial to evaluate HIV resistance testing in sub-Saharan Africa: a case study in clinical trial design in resource limited settings to optimize effectiveness and cost effectiveness estimates. HIV Clinical Trials, 18(4), 149–155.
Siedner, M. J., Kim, J.-H., Nakku, R. S., Bibangambah, P., Hemphill, L., Triant, V. A., … Hunt, P. W. (2016). Persistent Immune Activation and Carotid Atherosclerosis in HIV-Infected Ugandans Receiving Antiretroviral Therapy. Journal of Infectious Diseases, 213(3), 370–378.
Siedner, M. J., Kim, J.-H., Nakku, R. S., Hemphill, L., Triant, V. A., Haberer, J. E., … Bangsberg, D. R. (2016). HIV infection and arterial stiffness among older-adults taking antiretroviral therapy in rural Uganda. AIDS, 30(4), 667–670.
Siedner, M. J., Santorino, D., Lankowski, A. J., Kanyesigye, M., Bwana, M. B., Haberer, J. E., & Bangsberg, D. R. (2015). A combination SMS and transportation reimbursement intervention to improve HIV care following abnormal CD4 test results in rural Uganda: a prospective observational cohort study. BMC Medicine, 13(1).