Biography

Janvier Gasana, MD, MPH, PhD, is associate professor and chair of Department of Environmental and Occupational Health at Kuwait University (KU) Faculty of Public Health since January of 2016. He also holds a secondment of one per week at Dasman Diabetes Institute in Kuwait City, Kuwait where he is investigating the mounting evidence of the link between environmental and occupational exposures and Diabetes and he is organizing a workshop on systematic reviews and meta-analysis of studies on Diabetes for researchers from DDI and KU. For 20 years, he was professor at Florida International University in Miami, Florida.
He has been a Consulting Expert in Health, Safety, & Environment for The World Bank and British Department For International Development, and Occupational Health, Safety, & Environment for USAID.
He was born, grew up, and became a medical doctor and professor in Rwanda. He then decided to pursue and apply the tools of public health sciences with a focus on environmental and occupational health, 1st at the Rwandan Medical School (RMS) where he was chair of the EOH Department for 4 years, then at the University of Illinois at Chicago where he earned master of public health (MPH) and PhD degrees. At FIU, he created a research team that developed substantial expertise in exposure/risk assessment, design and implementation of community-based studies, and systematic reviews/meta-analysis, and 2ry data analysis.
His translational research evolves around the exposome which is the concept that incorporates the complex environmental and occupational exposures we face as humans over a lifecourse. His research interests specifically encompass the role of environmental and occupational exposures to soil-, water-, air-, and food-borne contaminants; infections; allergens; injury; stress; genes; and the immune system in the pathological process that leads to the disease with the ultimate goal of preventing these exposures.