Elizabeth Suarez Receives 2026 Rutgers Health Chancellor Award for Excellence in Health Sciences Research
Elizabeth Suarez, PhD, MPH, an assistant professor in the Department of Biostatistics and Epidemiology at the Rutgers School of Public Health and a core member of the Center for Pharmacoepidemiology and Treatment Science at the Rutgers Institute for Health, Health Care Policy, and Aging Research, has received a 2026 Rutgers Health Chancellor Award for Excellence in Clinical or Health Sciences Research as an early-career investigator.
The award recognizes early-career investigators who have made significant contributions to impactful clinical or health sciences research across Rutgers Health. Suarez is among this year’s faculty honorees selected for the annual awards.
Much of Suarez’s work uses large health care data sets, including insurance claims and electronic health records, to study medication use and safety among pregnant people. Her research examines the safety of psychotropic medications and pharmacologic treatments for gestational diabetes in pregnancy. Her work also focuses on opioid use disorder in pregnancy and new approaches for monitoring medication safety during pregnancy.
“I’m honored to receive this award as an early-career faculty member, said Suarez. “I’m incredibly grateful to be building my career in a supportive environment that recognizes the value of research on pregnant people and their children.”
Before joining Rutgers, she completed postdoctoral training at Harvard Pilgrim Health Care Institute and Harvard Medical School, where she contributed to medication surveillance work for the U.S. Food and Drug Administration’s Sentinel Initiative. She later completed a second fellowship at Brigham and Women’s Hospital and Harvard Medical School, focused on perinatal and pediatric pharmacoepidemiology.
Suarez earned her PhD in epidemiology from the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill and her MPH in epidemiology from Boston University.
Established in 2020, the Rutgers Health Chancellor Awards recognize faculty and staff for contributions across research, education, clinical care, community service, mentorship, leadership, and other areas central to the Rutgers Health mission.
