Departmental Affiliations
Center & Institute Affiliations
Anna Kalbarczyk, DrPH '20, MPH is an implementation scientist, studying how programs and policies work to advance gender and health equity.
Contact Info
Research Interests
women's leadership; implementation science; implementation research; women's health across the life course; gender; knowledge translation; evidence-based decision making; capacity building; mentorship; training; education; applied learning; network analysis; bioethics; qualitative methods; mixed-methods;
Experiences & Accomplishments
I am an implementation scientist and gender specialist with extensive experience in international settings. My primary interests include promoting women's leadership in global health, conducting implementation research, incorporating intersectional and gender lenses into research and dissemination, institutional capacity strengthening, and knowledge translation for policy makers.
I serve as the Assistant Director of the Johns Hopkins Center for Global Health which services the entire University and seeks to promote interdisciplinarity in global health. My work and research aims to improve the capacity of academic institutions to support global health training across the continuum of education.
I am also the co-Director of the Gender and Health Summer Institute which offers applied courses for health trainees and professionals seeking skills in gender research and programming.
Current projects include:
1) HPV IMPACT - Designing and testing innovative methods to measure HPV coverage using an equity lens.
2) The Emerging Women Leaders in Global Health (EDGE) Initiative. Activities include regular story-telling seminars, a one-week course, and an active virtual network with more than 1200 members around the world.
3) BEP Implementation Research in Rural Bangladesh. This study is designed to inform future nutritional supplementation programs, targeting, and delivery models. My work focused on generating formative evidence to inform trial design and analysis of agency and gender norms data collected during the trial.
Recent past projects include:
1) THRIVE - Transforming Health: The Role and Impact of Women's Leadership in the Health Sector. Moving beyond the well-documented barriers that women leaders face in global health, this study seeks to document the unique approaches that women leaders use to make an impact on health programs and policies.
2) GENDER FORWARD (Framework for Responsive and Adaptive Design in Digital Health). Generate and test a framework to inform the design and implementation of digital health interventions.
Pursuing new research in:
- Health systems responses to menopause
- Technology-facilitated violence and its impacts on older women's health and wellbeing, and women's leadership
- Integration of AI in public health research and pedagogy
Honors & Awards
Excellence in Teaching, 2016-2017
Excellence in Teaching, 2017-2018
Excellence in Teaching, 2019-2020
Excellence in Teaching, 2020-2021
Excellence in Teaching, 2021-2022
Excellence in Teaching, 2022-2023
Excellence in Teaching, 2023-2024
Excellence in Teaching, 2024-2025
Select Publications
Selected publications on global health training, mentorship, and interdisciplinary approaches
Morgan R, Kalbarczyk A, de la Paz M*, Boy-Mena E, Coates A. Addressing harmful norms in sexual health services: A gender equality and health imperative to advance the rights of cisgender and transgender individuals. World Health Bulletin. 2024 Dec, 102(12).
Kalbarczyk A, Brownlee N, Katz E. Of money and men: a scoping review to map gender barriers to immunization coverage in low-and middle-income countries. Vaccines. 2024, 12(6), 625
Kalbarczyk A, Saksena K, Colder Carras M, Gomes I, Zon J, Zhou X, Agarwal S. Developing a gender framework for responsive and adaptive design in digital health (FORWARD) from a review of reviews. BMC Digital Health. 2025; 3(91).
Kalbarczyk A, Nakatabira M, Banchoff K, Ahmed I, Abdulkader S, Gelibo T, Jacobs C, Kuo H, Rabary M, Morgan R. Exploring the perceived impact and influence of women leaders across sub-Saharan Africa on health policy and gender equity. BMJ Global Health. 2025. 10(12):e021163
Kalbarczyk A, Banchoff K, Perry KE, Pram Nielsen C, Malhotra A, Morgan R. A scoping review on the impact of women’s global leadership: evidence to inform global health leadership. BMJ Global Health. 2024