Department of Epidemiology

School of Public Health

Courtney Blondino, B.S., M.P.H., Ph.D.

Female student in a black jacket standing in front of fall trees

Prior Degree(s)

  • Bachelor of Science, Human Nutrition, Foods and Exercise from Virginia Tech (2015)
  • Master of Public Health, Epidemiology from University of Kentucky (2017)

Advisor

Dr. Elizabeth Prom-Wormley

Dissertation Title

Modeling Substance Use and Mental Disorder Comorbidity Using Latent Variable and Network Approaches

Awards Received/Special Achievements

  • I received five awards while in the program: VCU Libraries Scholarship from VCU Business Services (2020); Alumnae Continuing Education Scholarship from the Sigma Kappa Foundation (2020); Charles C. Clayton Doctoral Scholarship from VCU School of Medicine (2019); Phi Kappa Phi Honor Society Induction Award from VCU School of Medicine (2019); and Phi Kappa Phi Academic Achievement Award from VCU School of Medicine (2018).
  • I had the opportunity to represent the Division of Epidemiology through a School of Medicine Graduate programs promotional video and as a "This is Public Health Ambassador" for the Association for Association of Schools and Programs of Public Health. I also served the Division as a student member of the MPH curriculum committee (2018-2019), student ambassador (2019), and as a student representative on the tenure review committee for Dr. Zhao (2019). I was also inducted into the Phi Kappa Phi Honorary Society and the Delta Omega Honorary Society in Public Health (Delta Eta) chapter during my time at VCU. I served as President of Delta Eta in 2019.
  • I supported the Applied Data Analysis I and II courses and the Psychiatric Epidemiology course as a teaching assistant.
  • I volunteered with the Peter Paul Development Center and the Community Action Network since 2017, providing technical assistance in the development of surveys, analyzing survey results, and presenting findings to the community. I began to serve on the Community Action Network's Steering Committee in 2019. I also supported the development and implementation of the Richmond, VA COVID-19 Needs Assessment Survey under the supervision of Dr. Prom-Wormley after the hit of the pandemic to assess the needs of the community and stakeholders that support the community.
  • In addition to my work in the Division of Epidemiology, I also had the opportunity to work as a research assistant for the School of Medicine in the Office of Assessment, Evaluation and Scholarship; as a research assistant for the American Medical Association; and as an epidemiology consultant with Venebio Group.

Publications and Presentations

Accepted manuscripts:

  • Blondino, C., Clifford, J., Lu, J., & Prom-Wormley, E.C. The Association between Internalizing and Externalizing Severity with Current Use of Cigarettes, E-cigarettes, and Alcohol in Adults: Wave 1 (2013-2014) of the Population Assessment of Tobacco and Health (PATH) Study. Accepted to Addictive Behaviors.
  • Usidame, B., Gibson, E., Diallo, A., Blondino, C., Clifford, J., Zanjani, F., Sargent, L., Price, E., Slattum, P., Parsons, P., Prom-Wormley, E.C. Understanding the Preference for Receiving Mental Health and Substance Use Support in African Americans 50 and Older. Accepted to Journal of Prevention and Intervention in the Community.
  • Daly, N., Parsons, M., Blondino, C., Clifford, J., Prom-Wormley, E.C. Association between caregiver depression and child after-school program participation. Accepted to Journal of Family Social Work.
  • Blondino, C.*, Gormley, M.*, Taylor, D.H., Lowery, E., Clifford, J., Burkart, B., Graves, W., Lu, J., & Prom-Wormley, E.C. The Influence of Co-Occurring Substance Use on the Effectiveness of Opiate Treatment Programs According to Intervention Type. Accepted to Epidemiologic Reviews.
  • Gormley, M.*, Blondino C.*, Taylor, D., Lowery, E., Graves, W., Clifford, J.S., Prom-Wormley, E.C., & Lu, J. Assessment of polysubstance use during opioid use disorder treatment in the United States: A systematic review. Accepted to Epidemiologic Reviews.
  • Park Y, Ryan MH, Santen SA, Sabo R, Blondino C, Magee ML. Nurturing the Student, Sustaining the Mission: 20 Years of the International/Inner-City/Rural Preceptorship Program. Fam Med. 2019;51(10):823-829. https://doi.org/10.22454/fammed.2019.358223
  • Prom-Wormley, E.C., Clifford, J.S., Bourdon, J., Barr, P., Blondino, C., Ball, K. M., Montgomery, J., Davis, J. K., Real, J.E., Edwards, A., Thiselton, D., Wilson, D., Creighton, G.C., & Newbille, C. (2019). Developing community-based strategies with family health history education: Assessing the association between community resident family history and interest in health education. Social Science and Medicine. doi: 10.1016/j.socscimed.2019.02.011
  • Santen, S.A., Feldman, M., Weir, S., Blondino, C., Rawls, M., & DiGiovanni, S. (2018). Developing Comprehensive Strategies to Evaluate Medical School Curricula. Medical Science Educator. doi:10.1007/s40670-018-00640

Manuscripts under review:

  • Furnari, M., Blondino, C., Eldridge, A., Thaler, E., McKerrow, I., Lahti, E., & Santen, S. The Women’s Leadership Development Program: Building Capacity for Women-Identified Medical Student Leaders. Submitted to Academic Medicine.
  • Blondino, C. & Prom-Wormley, E.C. A Network Approach to Substance Use, Internalizing, and Externalizing Comorbidity in U.S. Adults. Submitted to Addictive Behaviors.

Manuscripts in process:

  • Blondino, C., Perera, R., & Prom-Wormley, E.C. Using Latent Class Analysis to Understand Comorbidity of Substance Use and Internalizing and Externalizing Symptoms in Adults.
  • Blondino, C., Daly, N., Ramos, E., Okala, O., Vanyukov, M., & Prom-Wormley, E.C. Association Between the Perceived Level of Social Support and Substance Use Disorder Severity in Adults. Submitted to Addictive Behaviors.
  • Clifford, J., Wilson, T., Blondino, C., Prom-Wormley, E.C. The Effect of Coupon Receipt on the Relationship Between Income and Past 12-Month Electronic and Conventional Cigarettes Use in Adults.
  • Chartier, K., Prom-Wormley, E.C., Blondino, C., Sankoh, M., Mulroy, N., Lee, A., Karriker-Jaffe, K., & Bares, C. Family History and Alcohol Stigma in a Medically Underserved Sample of Drinkers.
  • Brown, C.B., Clifford, J.S., Blondino, C., & Prom-Wormley, E.C. Utilization of Care Coordination and Routine Location of Healthcare Services in the East End Community of Richmond, VA.
  • DiazGranados, D., Olex, A., Garber, A., McInnes, B., Blondino, C., Goldberg, S., & Santen, S. Using Natural Language Processing for Student Reflection Evaluation.
  • Joyce, M., Pedram, S., Buono, B., Grossman, C., Blondino, C., Santen, S., Feldman, M. Opportunities for Reinforcing Ultrasound Training in the Clerkship Clinical Learning Environment.
  • Mariani, A.C. & Blondino, C., Acculturation and Familial Relations on Cannabis, Cocaine, and Prescription Drug Misuse in Filipino American Adults: National Latino and Asian-American Study of Mental Health.

Poster presentations (accepted): 

  • Wilson, T.L., Blondino, C.T., Prom-Wormley, E.C. Exploring the Role of E-cigarettes across Cessation Behaviors among US Adults. 27th Annual Meeting of the Society for Research on Nicotine and Tobacco, Virtual, February 24-27, 2021.
  • Blondino, C., Perera, R., Prom-Wormley, E.C. Using Latent Class Analysis to Understand Comorbidity of Substance Use and Internalizing and Externalizing Symptoms in U.S. Adults. 53rd Annual Society for Epidemiologic Research, Virtual, December 16-18, 2020.
  • Wilson, T.L., Clifford, J.S., Blondino, C.T., Prom-Wormley, E.C. Examining the Association between Race and Mental Health on Lifetime Frequency of E-nicotine Use in U.S. Adults. 2020 Virginia Public Health Association, Virtual, May, 2020.
  • Clifford, J.S., Wilson, T., Blondino, C., Prom-Wormley, E.C. The effect of electronic and conventional cigarette coupon receipt on the relationship between income level and past 12-month use in adults in PATH. 26th Annual Meeting of the Society for Research on Nicotine and Tobacco, New Orleans, LA, March 11-14, 2020.
  • Lee, J., Blondino, C., Chapman, D. Evaluation of the Autoregressive Cross Lagged Effects among Adolescents' Smartphone Addiction and Online/Offline Delinquency. 52nd Annual Society for Epidemiologic Research, Minneapolis, MN, June 18-21, 2019.
  • Blondino, C., Gormley, M., Taylor, D.D.H., Lowery, E., Clifford, J.S., Burkart, B., Graves, W.C., Lu, J., Prom-Wormley E.C. The Impact of Polysubstance Use on the Effectiveness of Opioid Use Disorder Therapy by Treatment Type: A Systematic Review. 52nd Annual Society for Epidemiologic Research, Minneapolis, MN, June 18-21, 2019.
  • Gormley, M., Blondino, C., Taylor, D.D.H., Lowery, E., Clifford, J.S., Burkart, B., Graves, W.C., Prom-Wormley, E.C., Lu, J. Assessment of Polysubstance Use During Opioid Use Disorder Treatment in the United States: A Systematic Review. 52nd Annual Society for Epidemiologic Research, Minneapolis, MN, June 18-21, 2019.
  • MacDonald, J., Usidame, B., Forr, T., Blondino, C., Prom-Wormley, E.C. Smoking, Drinking, and Aging: Tobacco and Alcohol Effects on Mental Health in Older American Adults. 11th Annual Virginia Commonwealth University Annual Poster Symposium for Undergraduate Research and Creativity, Richmond, VA, April 24, 2019.
  • Paulson, L., Carlyle, K., Blondino, C., Prom-Wormley, E.C. Association Between Threat, Attempt, and Occurrence of Intimate Partner Violence and Chronic Alcohol Use, 14th Annual VCU Women’s Health Research Day, Richmond, VA, April 12, 2018.
  • Clifford, J.S., Ball, K.M., Blondino, C., Prom-Wormley, E.C. The associations between conventional and electronic cigarette use with tobacco messaging. Annual conference of the Virginia Public Health Association, Lynchburg, VA, April, 2018.
  • Ball, K.M., Clifford, J., Blondino, C., Do, E., Maes, H., Prom-Wormley, E.C. Understanding the associations between opinions towards tobacco and youth current poly-tobacco use. 6th triennial conference of Virginia Conference on Youth Tobacco Use, Richmond, VA, March, 2018.
  • Blondino, C., Lu, J., Prom-Wormley, E.C. Mental health among current tobacco and alcohol dual users. 24th Annual Meeting of the Society for Research on Nicotine and Tobacco, Baltimore, MD, February 21-24, 2018.

Oral presentations (accepted):

  • Chartier, K. G., Prom-Wormley, E., Bares, C. B., Blondino, C. T., Mulroy, T., Miles, K., Lee, A. G., Sankoh, M., & Karriker-Jaffe, K. J. When genomics are unavailable: Prioritizing prevention using family history of alcohol problems for medically-underserved adults. Oral presentation at the Society for Prevention Research Annual Meeting, Virtual Program. June, 2021.
  • Blondino, C., Perera, R., Prom-Wormley, E.C. Using Latent Class Analysis to Characterize Comorbidity of Substance Use and Internalizing and Externalizing Symptoms in U.S. Adults. Virginia Commonwealth University Division of Epidemiology Seminar Series, Richmond, VA, February 18, 2020.
  • Blondino, C., Prom-Wormley, E.C. Using Social Network Analysis to Evaluate Collaboration Among Community-Serving Organizations in the East End of Richmond, Virginia. Virginia Commonwealth University Division of Epidemiology Seminar Series, Richmond, VA, March 19, 2019.
  • Blondino, C., Perera, R., Prom-Wormley, E.C. Confirmatory Factor Analysis of Internalizing, Externalizing, and Substance Use Problem Symptoms in PATH. Virginia Commonwealth University Division of Epidemiology Seminar Series, Richmond, VA, May 1, 2018.