Editors

Editor-in-Chief

Randy Wykoff, MD, MPH & TM

Randy Wykoff is Founding Dean of the College of Public Health at East Tennessee State University, in Johnson City, Tennessee. Trained as a physician (Preventive Medicine and Pediatrics), he now focuses on the public health challenges facing rural and other resource-limited settings. He received his dual MD–MPH &TM from Tulane in 1981. From 1999 to 2002, Dr. Wykoff served as Deputy Assistant Secretary for Health (Disease Prevention and Health Promotion) for the United States Department of Health and Human Services, which included a stint as Acting Executive Director for the President’s Council on Physical Fitness and Sports (2001). He has also held positions within the US Food and Drug Administration and the South Carolina Department of Health and Environmental Control. More recently, Dr. Wykoff served as Co-Editor (alongside the late Dr. F. Douglas Scutchfield) of Appalachian Health: Culture, Challenges, and Capacity (2022), published by the University Press of Kentucky to highlight long-term trends affecting the health and well-being of the people of Appalachia.

Dr. Wykoff has no competing editorial or research interests regarding his role as Editor-in-Chief of the Journal of Appalachian Health.

Senior Associate Editor

Erin Haynes, DrPH, MS

Erin Haynes is a Professor of Environmental Health at the University of Cincinnati. She received her master’s degree in Toxicology from the University of Cincinnati and Doctorate in Public Health from the University of Michigan School of Public Health in Environmental Health Sciences. She then completed a postdoctoral fellowship in the Molecular Epidemiology in Children’s Environmental Health training program at the University of Cincinnati before joining UC as faculty in Environmental Health. Dr. Haynes’ primary research interest is to conduct community engaged environmental health research. She grew up in rural Appalachian Ohio and is passionate about working with rural communities to address their environmental health research questions. She is the Director of the Community Outreach and Engagement Core within the NIEHS Environmental Health Center and the Co-Director of the Community Engagement Core within the Center for Clinical and Translational Science and Training.

Dr. Haynes has no competing editorial or research interests regarding her role as Senior Associate Editor of the Journal of Appalachian Health.

Managing Editor

Rachel E. Dixon, MPhil

Rachel, a native of Kentucky, has familial roots in Letcher County (Southeast Kentucky) and is an editor and researcher working at the intersection of health and community development. Her parents—and especially her late Father, Tom Dixon—instilled in her a deep love of Appalachian culture and encouraged her interest in rural health

Rachel received her Bachelor of Arts degree in English and WRD (Writing, Rhetoric & Digital Studies) from the University of Kentucky, where she was a Gaines Fellow in the Humanities and pre-medicine student. From 2017 to 2018, she held a research post at the Charles F. Kettering Foundation in Dayton, Ohio, and she collaborated there on projects to advance deliberative civic engagement. In 2018, Rachel moved to England, where she received her MPhil (with distinction) in Comparative Social Policy from the University of Oxford’s Green Templeton College.

Rachel brings a wealth of editorial experience, having worked on research at the University of Kentucky College of Public Health and at other institutions. Most recently, she assisted Drs. Doug Scutchfield and Randy Wykoff with the publication of an anthology highlighting health disparities in Appalachia: Appalachian Health: Culture, Challenges and Capacity (University Press of Kentucky, 2022). In addition to her editorial work, Rachel continues to publish research in the areas of just transition, rural community development and the social determinants of health.

Ms. Dixon has no competing editorial or research interests regarding her role as managing editor of the Journal of Appalachian Health.

Media & Marketing Coordinator

Bradley Firchow

Bradley Firchow is a medical student in the Rural Physician Leadership Program at the University of Kentucky College of Medicine. His primary research focus is local health department accreditation. Bradley is a National Health Service Corps scholar and plans to practice primary care in rural Central Appalachia upon completing residency. He currently serves on the board of the National Rural Health Association Student Constituency Group, where he leads initiatives to engage students in rural health scholarship and advocacy.

From 2017 to 2021, Bradley was a researcher and health communications specialist for the U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, where he worked on the Child Development Studies Team and served in the Joint Information Center for U.S. COVID-19 Pandemic response.

Mr. Firchow has no competing editorial or research interests regarding his role as Media & Marketing Coordinator for the Journal of Appalachian Health.