WHO: The Herschel S. Horowitz Center for Health Literacy at the University of Maryland School of Public Health hosts guest speaker Debra Roter, DrPH, as part of their ongoing Speaker Series.

WHAT: Dr. Roter, a Professor at Johns Hopkins Bloomberg School of Public Health, will present a lecture entitled "Improving the Quality of Patient-Physician Communications: A Prescription for Health Literacy." She will discuss her research into how doctors and patients speak with each other and present strategies on how to improve both their interactions and the health outcome of patients.

WHEN: Friday, January 30, 2009 from 2:00

p.m. to 3:00 p.m.

WHERE: Room 1312 of the School of Public Health Building, University of Maryland

ABOUT THE SPEAKER: An expert in health communication dynamics, Dr. Roter's methods of analyzing medical encounters have been widely adopted by researchers, both nationally and internationally. Her recent work has investigated the association between patients' and physicians' ethnicity and gender and their communication styles. In December, she was a speaker at the NIH Summit on the Science of Eliminating Health Disparities.