Reproductive Health

Featured Commentary: Adrian Grant’s pioneering use of evidence synthesis in perinatal medicine, 1980–1992

Systematic reviews of existing research are needed to help reduce the enormous amount of wasted resources in biomedical research. Whether already available or needed but unavailable, systematic reviews are a key element in prioritising questions for new research, and for informing the design of additional studies. One of the most important of Adrian Grant’s many contributions was to recognise this a decade before it began to become more widely accepted. In this sphere, as well as in many others, he was a real pioneer.

Dr José M. Belizán

José M. Belizán, MD, PhD, a native of Argentina, is a medical doctor, with a PhD in Reproductive Health Sciences, Superior Researcher of his country's National Board of Science and Technology. He is the Editor-in-Chief of Reproductive Health.

He is the former director of the Pan American Health Organization/WHO’s Latin American Center for Perinatology in Montevideo, Uruguay and currently is a senior scientist of the Department of Mother and Child Health Research at the Institute for Clinical Effectiveness and Health Policy (IECS) in Buenos Aires, Argentina. He is currently also Adjunct Professor of the Tulane University School of Public Health and Tropical Medicine, and Adjunct Professor of the School of Public Health, University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill. He has worked in many Latin American Institutions, including the Institute of Nutrition of Central America and Panama (INCAP), in Guatemala and Social Security Hospitals in Mexico. He is the former Director of the Centro Rosarino de Estudios Perinatales (CREP) and a former professor at the School of Medicine in Rosario, Argentina. He is an obstetrician and epidemiologist and has participated in numerous major perinatal trials.

Dr Sunni Mumford

Sunni Mumford, Ph.D., is an Earl Stadtman Investigator in the Epidemiology Branch, Division of Intramural Population Health Research, of the Eunice Kennedy Shriver National Institute of Child Health and Human Development. Dr. Mumford's research focuses on the interplay between diet and male and female reproductive health and fertility. Dr. Mumford earned her doctoral degree in epidemiology from the Gillings School of Global Public Health, University of North Carolina, Chapel Hill. This training was preceded by a Master’s of Science degree in biostatistics from the Harvard University School of Public Health and a Bachelor’s of Science degree in statistics from the College of Sciences at the Utah State University.

Dr. Mumford’s research interests focus on the relation between diet and the biologic capacity for reproduction irrespective of pregnancy intentions. Despite diet’s importance for human survival, its relation to fecundity remains an understudied area with many critical data gaps. Dr. Mumford has been an integral investigator on two longitudinal epidemiologic studies: the BioCycle Study and the Effects of Aspirin on Gestation and Reproduction (EAGeR) Trial. Her responsibilities have included leadership roles in the analysis of diet in relation to a spectrum of reproductive outcomes (e.g., hormonal profiles, menses, ovulation) in BioCycle, and in the development of the nutritional component for the EAGeR Trial. Dr. Mumford also serves as a principal investigator in the Folic Acid and Zinc Supplementation Trial (FAZST), and the Impact of Diet, Exercise And Lifestyle (IDEAL) Fertility Study, which seek to determine dietary influences on male and female fertility. Overall, her work seeks to elucidate the complex relationships between diet, metabolism, and determinants of fertility.