Dr. Louisa Gilbert is a licensed social worker and internationally recognized researcher with over 25 years of experience and more than 150 peer-reviewed publications. She specializes in developing and evaluating evidence-based interventions for women affected by gender-based violence (GBV), substance use, HIV, and trauma. As Co-Director of Columbia’s Social Intervention Group (SIG) and Co-Founder of the Global Health Research Center of Central Asia (GHRCCA), Dr. Gilbert has led numerous multi-level intervention projects addressing the interconnected risks of substance misuse, GBV, trauma, and HIV/AIDS among vulnerable populations in both the U.S. and Central Asia. Her research has concentrated on advancing a continuum of interventions to prevent intimate partner violence (IPV) and GBV, particularly among women involved in the criminal justice system (see projectwings.org). More recently, she has focused on implementing strategies to prevent opioid overdose among people who inject drugs in Central Asia, in collaboration with teams at SIG and GHRCCA. Dr. Gilbert also teaches a newly developed course at Columbia titled “Harm Reduction Policies, Programming and Practice to Tackle the Opioid Epidemic.”
