Safe Babies Safe Moms

Aimee Danielson, PhD, is the Founder and Director of the Women’s Mental Health Program at MedStar Georgetown University Hospital.  She is a Clinical Psychologist and Associate Professor of Psychiatry and Obstetrics & Gynecology in the Georgetown School of Medicine.  She has worked exclusively in the field of perinatal mental health since creating her own postdoctoral fellowship in this area in 2002. Since that time, she has developed and implemented numerous clinical, academic and research programs to respond to the unmet mental health needs of perinatal women.  In 2008, she founded the Women’s Mental Health Program at MedStar Georgetown University Hospital in response to a critical need for specialized care at this institution and in the region. This program, which she continues to direct and participate in clinical care, provides specialized psychiatric care for pregnant and postpartum women.  Across MedStar, she leads numerous efforts to train medical providers, residents, students, and nurses on screening for perinatal mental health disorders and has successfully implemented universal maternal depression screening across various hospital-based settings including outpatient obstetrics, acute inpatient obstetrics and pediatrics.

Dr. Danielson is a founding member of the DC Metro Perinatal Mental Health Collaborative and an active member of several local maternal mental health initiatives, each of which have enabled her to grow the capacity of perinatal mental health providers across DC and serve as an advocate for both perinatal mental health awareness and increased access to quality mental health care.  Over the past several years, she has led numerous efforts centrally focused on expanding perinatal mental health services in the District of Columbia.  Most recently, this work has focused on the integration of mental health care into the obstetric setting at MedStar Washington Hospital Center as part of the “Safe Babies, Safe Moms” MedStar/Clark initiative.

As an expert in the field, she speaks locally and nationally on topics related to maternal mental health and wellness in women.  She has been an invited speaker on On Point with Tom Ashbrook (NPR), as well as contributing to stories in the Washington Post and the Huffington Post.

Since 2017, Janine A. Rethy, MD, MPH, FAAP, has served as Division Chief, Community Pediatrics, MedStar Georgetown University Hospital, and an Assistant Professor of Pediatrics at Georgetown University School of Medicine. She is also Medical Director of the KIDS Mobile Medical Clinic/Ronald McDonald Care Mobile® and its new FITNESS Program. She is the Director of Medical Education for Community Pediatrics.

Dr. Rethy has extensive experience implementing and evaluating best-practice solutions in community and preventive health as well as health systems transformations in the private, non-profit, and public sectors. Throughout her career, she has been committed to decreasing health disparities, helping families and communities to become healthy and thrive, and teaching the next generation of community-oriented health care providers. She is particularly interested in reducing pediatric obesity, increasing breastfeeding, integrating social determinants into the primary care setting, and optimizing health systems delivery and clinical-community linkages.

Dr. Rethy is a Fellow of the American Academy of Pediatrics and of the Academy of Breastfeeding Medicine, and serves the American Academy of Pediatrics as a Childhood Obesity Advisor for Continuing Health.

Angela D. Thomas, DrPH, MPH, MBA, brings nearly 20 years of experience in the scientific and administrative leadership of translational and clinical research from Federal and non-Federal sponsors. She currently serves as the vice president of healthcare delivery research at MedStar Health Research Institute.

Dr. Thomas is responsible for leading a team of experts to apply rigorous scientific methods to enable next-generation healthcare delivery through quality, safety, innovation, health economics, payment reform, outcomes, health services research, data science, and health equity. This team of healthcare delivery experts lead, implement, and evaluate data-driven solutions that support policies and programs that improve healthcare in a manner that integrates science with the clinical and operational expertise required to meet patient and community needs. Dr. Thomas also ensures that these research activities leverage the collective leadership and unique strengths of MedStar Health and Georgetown University.

Dr. Thomas’ research interests focus on health equity and patient safety. In March 2020, the A. James & Alice B. Clark Foundation funded $27 Million of the $30 Million Safe Babies Safe Moms initiative. As the Executive Leader of this program, Dr. Thomas has overall responsibility for ensuring the development, implementation, and evaluation of an evidence-based program that will reduce disparities in maternal and infant mortality in Washington, DC. In addition, she contributes her research expertise in disparities, health equity, and patient safety to the initiative to uncover the contributing factors leading to disparities in maternal and infant harm. Through her previous work at the University of Michigan, Dr. Thomas served as a key member of the Pelvic Floor Research Group in the Department of Obstetrics and Gynecology where she published and presented, both nationally and internationally, on research related to urinary incontinence in women. Dr. Thomas gained valuable research expertise in using qualitative and quantitative survey methods to understand the context of racial disparities in urinary incontinence, which ultimately won an award from the International Continence Society. With a scientific and administrative career spanning nearly two decades, Dr. Thomas has extensive expertise executing all aspects of research projects, including retrospective data analysis, chart review and abstraction, recruitment and retention, and overall project leadership. She has hands-on experience with both qualitative and quantitative research methods as well as extensive experience analyzing user data from electronic health records, patient safety event management systems, AHRQ patient safety indicators, extraction of severe maternal morbidity cases, using the Institute for Healthcare Improvement’s Global Trigger method, statistical analyses, and disseminating research findings through journal articles, conference presentations, and technical reports. Dr. Thomas’ research has been funded by the Latham Foundation, published in several peer-reviewed academic journals, and covered by media outlets such as Modern Healthcare and WTOP.

Dr. Thomas received a Bachelor of Science in biopsychology and the cognitive sciences from the University of Michigan. She received a Master of Public Health in health behavior and health education, also from the University of Michigan. Later, she received her Master of Business Administration from the Walsh College of Accountancy and Business Administration and her Doctor of Public Health in Advanced Practice Leadership in Public Health from the University of South Florida.