City Research Scientist

The New York City Department of Health and Mental Hygiene (NYC DOHMH)’s Bureau of Hepatitis, HIV, and Sexually Transmitted Infections (BHHS) oversees the City’s response to viral hepatitis, HIV, and sexually transmitted infections (STIs). Across a range of programs and through extensive collaboration with other parts of NYC DOHMH and external stakeholders, BHHS leads testing initiatives; prevention, care, and treatment programming; epidemiology and surveillance; research and evaluation; training and technical assistance; community engagement; social marketing; policy advocacy; and racial equity and social justice initiatives.  New York City (NYC) has the largest and most diverse HIV epidemic in the United States. To effectively reduce HIV transmission and HIV-related morbidity and mortality, accurate surveillance data is required to guide public health decision-making. Additionally, surveillance case counts determine the allocation of millions of dollars of resources for HIV prevention as well as treatment and support services for HIV-infected persons. The HIV Surveillance Unit in the HIV Epidemiology Program (HEP) is responsible for the surveillance of HIV and AIDS in New York City and for generating the accurate case counts and complete descriptive data on diagnoses, clinical status, laboratory test results, and mortality that are needed to monitor epidemic trajectory and guide public health decision-making. Surveillance objectives include: 1) To describe HIV transmission occurring in NYC; 2) To count and describe new HIV diagnoses and new AIDS diagnoses, including timing of initial diagnosis relative to infection and progression to AIDS; 3) To count and describe people living with HIV/AIDS in NYC, including how and where they became infected, health status, care status, and vital status.  HEP is seeking a City Research Scientist II (Data Analyst/Death Surveillance Team Lead) to lead HEP’s death surveillance activities to ascertain deaths among people with HIV in NYC as well as to contribute to core surveillance data activities. The HEP Data Analyst/Death Surveillance Team Lead will also play a critical role in helping the Program and Bureau to monitor the impact of the COVID-19 outbreak on HIV epidemiology in NYC, including the effect of the outbreak on key outcomes related to HIV detection (e.g., new HIV diagnoses) and HIV care (e.g., linkage to and engagement in HIV care, and HIV viral suppression) and mortality. 

DUTIES WILL INCLUDE BUT NOT BE LIMITED TO:

Report directly to Director of HIV Surveillance Operations.

Conduct death surveillance work, including matching HIV registry with local and national death registries.

Conduct quality assurance activities related to death surveillance.

Will coordinate follow-back investigations to identify unreported deaths among people with HIV.

Run death surveillance issues meeting monthly.

Assess and adjust for the impact of the COVID-19 crisis on HIV Surveillance mortality indictors.

Conduct general surveillance and analytic duties, such as, fulfilling external and internal data requests, checking quarterly frozen analytic datasets, creating diagnosing provider variable for frozen analytic datasets, and develop and run quarterly indicators related to surveillance data collection.

Manage geocoding HIV case data for reporting to CDC and program analyses.

Contribute to surveillance annual report, slide sets, web surveillance tables and other annual dissemination products.

Participate in weekly Analysts’ meetings and other meetings as requested.

Conduct special projects and perform other duties as assigned.

Contribute to developing, maintaining and enforcing protocols for HIV Surveillance data collection and management, and to data quality assurance activities related to HIV death surveillance.

Prepare scientific manuscripts, reports, protocols, and other written documents related to HIV Surveillance.

Prepare and deliver presentations of epidemiologic analyses to different audiences, including scientific audiences inside and outside the health department.

Minimum Qual Requirements

1.  For Assignment Level I (only physical, biological and environmental sciences and public health) A master’s degree from an accredited college or university with a specialization in an appropriate field of physical, biological or environmental science or in public health.
To be appointed to Assignment Level II and above, candidates must have:
1. A doctorate degree from an accredited college or university with specialization in an appropriate field of physical, biological, environmental or social science and one year of full-time experience in a responsible supervisory, administrative or research capacity in the appropriate field of specialization; or
2. A master’s degree from an accredited college or university with specialization in an appropriate field of physical, biological, environmental or social science and three years of responsible full-time research experience in the appropriate field of specialization; or
3. Education and/or experience which is equivalent to “1” or “2” above. However, all candidates must have at least a master’s degree in an appropriate field of specialization and at least two years of experience described in “2” above. Two years as a City Research Scientist Level I can be substituted for the experience required in “1” and “2” above.

NOTE:
Probationary Period
Appointments to this position are subject to a minimum probationary period of one year.

Preferred Skills

Master’s level degree in public health or related field is required.
Excellent analytic skills, including expertise in SAS, Excel, Access, and PowerPoint, including experience programmatically creating routine reports for distribution.
Experience with ArcGIS and Tableau helpful.
Experience in managing, cleaning and analyzing large surveillance and/or research datasets, and understanding of complex surveillance and epidemiologic monitoring systems.
Familiarity with the NYC surveillance system and/or similar system of other large jurisdiction(s).
Excellent interpersonal, research, written and verbal communication skills, and will be detail-oriented with outstanding organizational skills, and able to multi-task in a fast-paced, high-volume environment.
Able to interpret quantitative data, read, interpret and synthesize epidemiologic and other scientific literature, and be able to prepare presentations for diverse audiences.
Demonstrate ability to work with a diverse staff of epidemiologists, analysts and public health advisors, and will ideally have supervisory experience.

Additional Information

**IMPORTANT NOTES TO ALL CANDIDATES:

Please note: If you are called for an interview you will be required to bring to your interview copies of original documentation, such as:
• A document that establishes identity for employment eligibility, such as: A Valid U.S. Passport, Permanent Resident Card/Green Card, or Driver’s license.

• Proof of Education according to the education requirements of the civil service title.

• Current Resume

• Proof of Address/NYC Residency dated within the last 60 days, such as: Recent Utility Bill (i.e. Telephone, Cable, Mobile Phone)

Additional documentation may be required to evaluate your qualification as outlined in this posting’s “Minimum Qualification Requirements” section. Examples of additional documentation may be, but not limited to: college transcript, experience verification or professional trade licenses.

If after your interview you are the selected candidate you will be contacted to schedule an on-boarding appointment. By the time of this appointment you will be asked to produce the originals of the above documents along with your original Social Security card.

**LOAN FORGIVENESS

As a current or prospective employee of the Department of Health and Mental Hygiene, you may be eligible for federal loan forgiveness programs and state repayment assistance programs. For more information on Public Service Loan Forgiveness (PSLF) Program, Teacher Loan Forgiveness Program and Federal Perkins Loan Cancellation and Discharge, please visit: https://studentaid.ed.gov/sa/repay-loans/forgiveness-cancellation/public-service.

For information on the New York State Student Loan Repayment Assistance Programs, please visit: https://www.hesc.ny.gov/repay-your-loans/repayment-options-assistance/loan-forgiveness-cancellation-and-discharge.html.

“FINAL APPOINTMENTS ARE SUBJECT TO OFFICE OF MANAGEMENT & BUDGET APPROVAL”

To Apply

Apply online with a cover letter to https://a127-jobs.nyc.gov/.  In the Job ID search bar, enter: job ID number #   534416.

We appreciate the interest and thank all applicants who apply, but only those candidates under consideration will be contacted.

The NYC Health Department is committed to recruiting and retaining a diverse and culturally responsive workforce. We strongly encourage people of color, people with disabilities, veterans, women, and lesbian, gay, bisexual, and transgender and gender non-conforming persons to apply.

All applicants will be considered without regard to actual or perceived race, color, national origin, religion, sexual orientation, marital or parental status, disability, sex, gender identity or expression, age, prior record of arrest; or any other basis prohibited by law.

NOTE: This position is open to qualified persons with a disability who are eligible for the 55-a Program. Please indicate in your resume that you would like to be considered for the position under the 55-a Program.

Residency Requirement

New York City residency is generally required within 90 days of appointment. However, City Employees in certain titles who have worked for the City for 2 continuous years may also be eligible to reside in Nassau, Suffolk, Putnam, Westchester, Rockland, or Orange County. To determine if the residency requirement applies to you, please discuss with the agency representative at the time of interview.