Rate My Professor Becky Cook

Rebecca Cook, M.D., M.S., is an Assistant Professor in the Department of Population Health at Dell Medical School, The University of Texas at Austin, where she also holds an appointment as Assistant Professor in the Department of Internal Medicine. She serves as the AMPATH-Mexico Clinical Team Leader in the Department of Population Health. Cook brings a wealth of experience in global health and implementation science to her role. She completed her specialty training in internal medicine and pediatrics at Massachusetts General Hospital and earned master’s degrees in global health science and medical anthropology from Oxford University.

Throughout her career, Cook has worked extensively in sub-Saharan Africa, including Kenya, Uganda, Mozambique, and Liberia. Prior to joining UT Austin, she was Director of Clinical Services and Medical Education for Partners In Health Liberia. There, she developed the first rural training program for family medicine residents and intern doctors and led the PIH clinical team in partnering with Liberia's Ministry of Health to rebuild the health system following the Ebola epidemic. Currently in Austin, she practices as a medicine-pediatrics hospitalist attending at Dell Seton Medical Center. She teaches and mentors medical students and residents, and leads efforts to establish a long-term reciprocal partnership between UT Austin and a medical school and public health system in Puebla, Mexico. Her research interests center on health system transformation and implementation science aimed at reducing health inequities, as well as training future health professionals to improve health care delivery. Key publications include "Predictors of successful early infant diagnosis of HIV in a rural district hospital in Zambezia, Mozambique" (JAIDS, 2011), "Antimicrobial use in hospitalized patients: a multicentre point prevalence survey across seven hospitals in Ghana" (JAC-Antimicrobial Resistance, 2021), "Experience of living with type 1 diabetes in a low-income country: a qualitative study from Liberia" (BMJ Open, 2021), "Implementation of an antimicrobial stewardship programme in three regional hospitals in the south-east of Liberia: lessons learned" (JAC-Antimicrobial Resistance, 2022), and "Facing COVID-19 in Liberia: adaptations of the resilient and responsive health systems initiative" (Annals of Global Health, 2021).