College of Medicine names associate dean for graduate studies

Gillian Bartlett-Esquilant, PhD, has been named associate dean for graduate studies with the Texas A&M University College of Medicine, effective Nov. 1, 2024. In this role, Bartlett will oversee the college’s 12 degree programs and advise the dean on academic issues. 

Bartlett specializes in the translation of evidence into clinical practice through implementation science. Her current areas of focus are complex, large-scale health care problems and their stakeholder engagement and outcomes, specifically for vulnerable populations. She also has expertise in the implementation of precision medicine using patient-oriented strategies and the use of innovations in education to advance the discipline of translational biomedicine. 

Bartlett comes to Texas A&M from the University of Missouri School of Medicine, where she was the associate dean for graduate research education, director of the translational biosciences PhD program, and a professor of biomedical informatics, biostatistics and medical epidemiology. Prior to that, she was at McGill University, where she was professor and associate chair for research and graduate program director in family medicine, spearheading the development and successful accreditation of three training programs that now have more than 100 students. 

Bartlett brings significant research and administrative experience. She was principal investigator for Missouri for the Heartland consortium of the National Institutes of Health’s All of Us program, which seeks to advance precision medicine by collecting data from a million people. In Canada, she chaired the working party for the patient-reported indicator surveys project for primary care, which involved 22 countries through the international Organisation for Economic Co-operation and Development. She also was executive director of the network coordinating office of the Primary and Integrated Health Care Innovations Network, a pan-Canadian “network of networks” coordinated through the Canadian Institutes for Health Research Strategy for Patient Oriented Research.  

Bartlett earned a bachelor’s degree in psychology and a Master of Science and PhD in epidemiology, all from McGill University, followed by a two-year postdoctoral fellowship in social and preventive medicine at the University of Montréal. 

Her many awards and honors include being named a fellow with the International Society for Pharmacoepidemiology, the Distinguished Research Mentor Award by the North American Primary Care Research Group, the Carrie M. Derick Award for Excellence in Graduate Teaching and Supervision and the Faculty Honour List for Educational Excellence.