Board of Directors
Azita Amiri
Dr. Azita Amiri, PhD, RN is an Associate Professor at the University of Alabama in Huntsville, College of Nursing, and a Bloomberg Fellow at Johns Hopkins Bloomberg School of Public Health. Dr. Amiri is a nurse scientist with an interest in Public Health and Environmental Justice. She reaches out to environmental justice communities and educates them about potential environmental exposures and ways to mitigate the exposure. Furthermore, she measures indoor air quality in residential and occupational settings and studies the common indoor air exposures, their concentrations and sources, and their impact on pregnancy outcomes, child health, and well-being of the elderly.
Anabell Castro Thompson
Anabell Castro Thompson, MSN, APRN, ANP-C, FAAN, FAANP is a Nurse Practitioner and Senior Vice President of Health Equity at Equality Health.
A Fellow of the American Academy of Nursing and the American Association of Nurse Practitioners, Anabell’s leadership exemplifies sustained commitment towards improving healthcare for vulnerable and underserved communities, especially Latino Communities. Determined to bridge health care disparities, she is responsible for building and managing innovative programs and strategic initiatives around Cultural Care Models and the Social Determinants of Health.
Anabell is passionate about principles of environmental justice and climate equity and had the enormous pleasure to participate with Jane Fonda’s Fire Drills Friday’s – Climate and Health Session in December 2019.
Anabell is Immediate Past President of the National Association of Hispanic Nurses (NAHN) and serves on multiple national boards, including ANHE and ecoAmerica Health Leadership Circle. She has been honored as a distinguished alumni by both her alma maters—the University of Arizona and Arizona State University.
Daniel Smith
Daniel J. Smith, PhD, RN, CNE is a doctorally prepared nurse and the Weingarten Endowed Assistant Professors at Villanova University’s M. Louise Fitzpatrick College of Nursing. During my PhD Studies, I was a Robert Wood Johnson Foundation Future of Nursing Scholar, Cohort 5. My overarching research interest lies at the intersection of understanding the effects of climate change on the health outcomes of disenfranchised populations and how we can build climate resilience and adaptation skills in communities & health systems. In addition to my scholarship, I have worked clinical with multiple refugee and immigrant populations in the primary care setting. I am excited to be the co-chair of ANHE’s climate change committee and hope to bring my skills to advance the mission of the committee and the organization.
Tammy Davis
Tammy Davis, BS, RN currently lives in Birmingham, Alabama and has been a Registered Nurse for 12 years. She specializes in clinical research- electrophysiology, cardiovascular surgery and stroke. Tammy is currently the Regional Coordinating Center Manager for StrokeNet at the University of Alabama at Birmingham. Tammy has a passion for community service. She is a Girl Scout Lifetime Member, a member of the Birmingham Black Nurses Association (BBNA) and a Health Coordinator for her Faith Family. In BBNA she has served as the Continuing Education Coordinator and on the Heart Health Initiative with the American Heart Association. Tammy has also planned and organized two HIV education programs: one for college students and the other for Clergy. As several areas in Alabama are in environmental crisis, she is excited for the training the fellowship will provide so she can serve her community better.
Kelly Jones
Dr. Kelly K Jones, PhD, RN is passionate about ensuring that all neighborhoods are safe places to live, grow, and thrive. She brings to nursing research a background in both engineering and development, and unwavering faith that people, science, and hard work can build incredible things.
Kelly conducts environmental exposure research in the Neighborhood and Health Lab of the National Institute on Minority Health and Health Disparities at the National Institutes of Health*. She has particular expertise in the measurement of exposure at the individual level, and her work is currently focused on the inequitable effects of climate change across urban spaces.
Kelly is a graduate of the College of Nursing at the University of Illinois at Chicago, the School of Nursing at the University of Massachusetts Amherst, and the Colorado School of Mines. When not engaged in nursing research, she can be found hiking with her dog or cooking delicious meals with her partner.
Dr. Jones is serving in her personal capacity.
Aaron Salinas
Aaron Salinas, DNP, APRN,FNP-BC,PMHNP-BC, NRP is an Assistant Professor and the BSN Program Coordinator at the University of Texas Rio Grande Valley in Edinburg Texas. He has been in Academia for 7 years. In addition to his role with the School of Nursing . Dr. Salinas is a Nurse Practitioner with Board Certifications as a Family Nurse Practitioner and a Psychiatric Mental Health Nurse Practitioner. He is part of the UT Health Rio Grande Valley Team and sees patients at the University Health Center and does consultation work with a local psychiatrist and a pediatrician in the Rio Grande Valley. He is involved in many organizations at the local, state and national level where he serves on many of the organizations as a board member.
Nelson Tuazon
Nelson Tuazon, DNP, DBA, RN, NEA-BC, CENP, CPPS, CPHQ, CPXP, FNAP, FACHE, FAAN has a successful track record in nursing practice, academia, and executive leadership. Dr. Tuazon’s involvement in professional associations and boards has influenced nursing practice, nursing education, and public policy. He was the inaugural Editor-In-Chief of the Journal of the Philippine Nurses Association of America (now the Journal of Nursing Practice Applications and Reviews of Research). He serves as a peer reviewer of the Journal of Interprofessional Education & Practice. As founder of the San Antonio Nursing Consortium and Board Member of the Philippine-American Chamber of Commerce, he actively participates in public awareness campaigns, including the Stop-the-Bleed Program and humanitarian projects related to climate change in the Philippines. He serves as adjunct faculty at Excelsior University and UT Health San Antonio. His interests in the Environmental Health Nurse Fellowship focus on integrating environmental health and environmental justice into nursing practice, curriculum, public education, and health policy. Dr Tuazon is also Vice President & Associate Chief Nursing Officer at University Health in San Antonio, Texas.
Adelita G. Cantu
Adeita G. Cantu, PhD, RN is currently an Associate Professor at the University of Texas Health Science Center San Antonio School of Nursing. Dr. Cantu has extensive experience as a public health nurse working in the community through collaboration to ensure equitable health, particularly in minority, low income communities. Dr. Cantu’s environmental justice work involves teaching the next generation of health care professionals about climate change as a public health issue, as well as teaching low income youth about climate change and working with local policy makers to understand climate change and its inequitable burden to vulnerable, low income communities.