Executive Board

Dr Iveta Nagyova (PhD, FABMR) is the Head of the Department of Social and Behavioural Medicine at Pavol Jozef Safarik University (UPJS) in Kosice, Slovakia. She is also the Immediate Past President of the European Public Health Association (EUPHA; 2020–2024), Chair of the EUPHA/EPH Conference Foundation, a member of the Technical Advisory Group for Building an Innovation Ecosystem for Public Health at the WHO Regional Office for Europe, and a designated WHO/Europe National Focal Point for Behavioural and Cultural Insights. Previously, she served as a member of the WHO Technical Advisory Group on Behavioural Insights and Sciences for Health, the WHO/Europe Regional Director’s Advisory Council on Innovation for NCDs, and the European Advisory Committee on Health Research (EACHR). She is actively involved in the development and coordination of research projects, academic publishing, and the supervision of PhD students. Her research interests include biobehavioural and psychosocial innovations in chronic condition prevention and management, non-pharmacological interventions, behaviour change, and improving functional status and quality of life for individuals living with chronic disease. She is passionate about knowledge translation and improving health outcomes through evidence synthesis, co-design of integrated patient-centred care models, inventive implementation strategies, and scaling up effective interventions.

Dr. Tit Albreht, M.D. (1961), Slovenian, Ph.D. in Health Services Research at the University of Amsterdam, Head of the Centre for Health Care at the National Institute of Public Health of Slovenia, A senior researcher in the field of health services research, health policy and health systems research, member of the Scientific Committee of EUPHA, president of the Slovenian Preventive Medicine Society, member of the Health Council of the Ministry of Health of Slovenia. He acts as a reviewer of several scientific journals and of projects submitted for financing to the European Commission. From 2011 to 2014 he was a work package leader of the Work Package in the Joint Action EPAAC – European Partnership for Action Against Cancer. This process resulted in the European Guide on National Cancer Control Programmes. He was the co-ordinator of the Joint
Action Cancon (Cancer Control), an EU co-financed project dedicated to informing the development of cancer policies at the EU and Member State levels. Currently, he is the coordinator of the third Joint Action on cancer control, entitled innovative Partnership for Action Against Cancer (iPAAC). He is an Associate Professor of Public Health at the Medical Faculty of Ljubljana, Slovenia and teaching public health and epidemiology at the Medical Faculty of Maribor and at the Faculty of Nursing in Maribor.

Anthony Staines is Professor of Health Systems at the Centre for Integrated Care and School of Nursing, Psychotherapy and Community Health, Dublin City University, Dublin, Ireland. He is an epidemiologist and a  public health consultant whose research focusses on the uses of (digital) information in health care. He has a particular interest in child health and disability. Working closely with the Health Intelligence Unit in the Health Services Executive in Ireland, he has led a number of projects to deliver innovative health information approaches in Ireland and Europe.
He teaches on programmes in public health and health systems within DCU, and on digital health in an innovative national programme led by the Health Services Executive.
He was formerly the chair of the Irish Blood Transfusion service, and now leads St. Michael’s House, one of the larger providers of services for people with Intellectual Disability in Ireland.

University of Glasgow, Glasgow, United Kingdom

Patrícia is the Co-coordinator of EUPHAnxt, the network for students and young professionals in public health, including early career researchers and policymakers. She is a medical doctor and Public Health specialist from Portugal, currently pursuing a PhD at the ELSA AI Lab Northern Netherlands (ELSA-NN), based at the University Medical Center Groningen. Her research focuses on embedding ethical, legal, and societal (ELSA) principles into the development and implementation of responsible artificial intelligence (AI) in healthcare, with particular emphasis on creating safe, collaborative environments for AI systems.

With a strong interest in digital health and health policy, Patrícia brings an interdisciplinary approach to public health challenges, aiming to leverage her public health expertise and research background to foster AI-driven innovations that promote equity, well-being, and meaningful stakeholder engagement.

As EUPHAnxt Co-Coordinator, Patrícia actively promotes youth participation in shaping the future of public health in Europe and beyond, fostering connections between academic research, policy, and practice.

Manuel Franco, Social and Urban Epidemiologist, is Research Professor at the Basque Climate Change Research Centre Ikerbasque, Bilbao, Spain. He is adjunct faculty at the Johns Hopkins Bloomberg School of Public Health and the City University of New York CUNY Graduate School of Public Health, USA. He trained in medicine both in Madrid and Berlin. As a Fulbright Scholar he joined the Johns Hopkins Department of Epidemiology to obtain his PhD in the topics of social epidemiology and urban health. Back in Madrid he received the Marie Curie and Ramón y Cajal early-stage research awards. He was the Principal Investigator of the European Research Council Starting Grant Heart Healthy Hoods, studying urban characteristics in relation to cardiovascular disease. He has published 138 international peer reviewed articles and lead 15 research studies. He is interested in the dissemination of public health research, collaborating with different newspapers, televisions and radio programmes.

Stefan Mandić-Rajčević, MD, PhD, is an Assistant Professor of Social Medicine at the Faculty of Medicine, University of Belgrade, and serves as the President of the Serbian Public Health Association. He is the founder and director of the Laboratory for Infodemiology and Infodemic Management. Dr. Mandić-Rajčević completed his medical training in Belgrade (Serbia) and obtained his PhD in Occupational Health from the University of Milan (Italy). His early research at the International Centre for Rural Health (WHO Collaborating Centre) focused on professional toxicology and pioneering computational models for pesticide risk assessment. His current research portfolio integrates infodemiology, behavioral insights, and the social determinants of health. He has served as a Principal Investigator for World Health Organization (WHO) initiatives on infodemic management and as the Regional Team Lead for the USAID-funded MOMENTUM project, overseeing behavioral change strategies across Europe and Eurasia. Furthermore, he collaborated with the Emory Global Health Institute on multidisciplinary research to strengthen regional health security. Dr. Mandić-Rajčević has published over 70 international peer-reviewed articles and is dedicated to advancing evidence-based public health action and policy, and fostering international scientific exchange to address emerging global health challenges, especially related to the information environment, trust, and health behavior.

Ilmo Keskimäki (MD, PhD) is Research Professor at the Finnish Institute for Health and Welfare (THL) and Professor of Health Services Research at the Tampere University, Finland. He has specialised in Public Health Medicine.  His research has focused on health systems and policy analysis and developing research methods for the use of register based longitudinal data in health services research. He has particular interest in research on equity in health care and impacts of reforming services on health system performance. He has worked in research and administrative positions in national research institutes in Finland and advised the government on issues related to health systems and policy development and research. He has formerly served as a president for the European Public Health Association and the Society for Social Medicine in Finland.

Tea Lallukka is Professor of Medical Sociology at the University of Helsinki (Finland), and PI of the Helsinki Health Study, an occupational cohort followed up since 2000 (helsinki.fi/hhs). She is also an Associate at the Karolinska Institutet in Stockholm, an invited expert of the Global Burden of Disease project, and an Honorary Professor at the University College London. A majority of her studies has been conducted using cohort and registry data. She has also participated in systematic reviews and meta-analyses. Her key areas of interest are related to socioeconomic inequalities in health, working conditions, health behaviours, sleep, mental and musculoskeletal health, sickness absence, retirement and ageing, and conducting international comparisons. She additionally has a long expertise in collecting survey data.