Carlos Penilla, DrPH, MS
  • Home
  • Research & Policy
    • Fathers
    • National Drinking Water Alliance
    • Advanced Technologies
    • Grants
  • COVID-19 Photos
  • Publications
  • Mentoring
  • About
    • Experience
    • Contact

Postdoctoral Research Fellow
​UCSF Division of Adolescent and Young Adult Medicine
Department of Pediatrics

2018-Present  Health Quest: Engaging Adolescents in Health Science Careers with Technology-Rich Personalized Learning
Funded by NIH/NIGMS Science Education Partnership Award (Ozer, E, P.I.)

Working with a transdisciplinary team of psychologists, health services researchers and computer scientists to create Health Quest, an intelligent game-based learning environment and associated resources to increase adolescents' knowledge of, interest in and self-efficacy to pursue health science careers.

2018-Present  INSPIRE: A Self-Adaptive Personalized Behavior Change System for Adolescent Preventive Healthcare
Funded by NSF (Ozer, E, P.I.)

Collaborating on the design, implementation and investigation of INSPIRE, a self-adaptive personalized behavior change system for adolescent preventive health with a focus on alcohol use.

Research Project Director, UCSF Center for Health and Community
Department of Psychiatry

2007-12  Parental Influences on Obesity among Mexican American Children
Funded by NIH National Heart, Lung, and Blood Institute (Tschann, JM, P.I.)
Directed NIH-funded longitudinal study examining parental influences on obesity in 326 Mexican American children ages 8-10
Participated in developmental phases of research including focus groups, instrument development, and translations
Adapted and implemented field research procedures including structured interviews, dietary recalls, physical activity monitors, anthropometric measures, and videotaping of participant mealtime

2000-07  Spanish/English Web Site for Smoking Cessation Trials, Phase I, II, & III
Funded by Tobacco-Related Disease Research Program/UCOP (Muñoz, RF, P.I.)

Coordinated software programmers and developers in the development of a bilingual smoking cessation clinical trials website
Supervised Spanish-language translations and beta-testing with on-line participants
Recruited over 20,000 national and international internet participants to a randomized-controlled smoking cessation trial via search engines, press releases, public service announcements, and Google AdWords
Directed smoking cessation internet trials including follow-up interviews

Program Evaluation Consultant

2010-14  Familias Activas y Sanas, Mission Neighborhood Health Center, San Francisco
Advised pediatric clinical staff in the planning and implementation of obesity interventions that impacted over 500 children
Developed evaluation plans including assessment tools
Supervised clinic staff with intervention data collection
Conducted analysis and prepared evaluation report for clinic director
carlos.penilla@ucsf.edu​
  • Home
  • Research & Policy
    • Fathers
    • National Drinking Water Alliance
    • Advanced Technologies
    • Grants
  • COVID-19 Photos
  • Publications
  • Mentoring
  • About
    • Experience
    • Contact