Shariq I. Sherwani
Specializations: Health Communication and Organizational Communication
Bio
Shariq Sherwani received his MACPR and MBA degrees from The Ohio State University and his MS from Aligarh Muslim University, India. Prior to joining the doctoral program, he worked as a scientist in biomedical research for more than 2 decades (The Ohio State University, University of Cincinnati and Harvard University) and published his clinical and basic research in reputable peer-reviewed journals. Realizing that communication plays an important role in the delivery of effective healthcare to consumers, Shariq decided to pursue an area that would make a direct and positive impact in the realm of public health, healing, and medicine. Shariq’s research focuses on health communication, primarily in the area of caregiver stresses of end stage renal disease patients, their quality of life, and psychosocial outcomes. He applies the mixed methods approach and uses the quantitative, qualitative and critical methods to explore the questions at the intersectionality of public health, medicine, and policy-making by (a) developing intervention programs for the caregivers of end stage renal disease patients to help them cope better with the stresses and demands associated with caregiving, and (b) sharing the patient narratives using personal case studies, interviews, anecdotes, storytelling, focus groups, and photovoice. He also studies how each stakeholder develops meaningful relationships with the others based upon effective communication techniques to access healthcare, including therapeutic regimens and other treatments options leading to positive outcomes. Shariq also plans to incorporate auto-ethnographic accounts of caregiver- and patient-experiences and also explore how natural human emotions (hope and fear) relate to behavior intentions in the healthcare context. As a graduate teaching associate (GTA), Shariq is engaged in teaching the Fundamentals of Public Speaking (COMS 1030) undergraduate class. Shariq’s favorite authors, who guide his intellectual inquisitiveness in the academy, include Anzaldúa, Foucault, and Burke. Shariq is multilingual and, other than English, thrives in his mother-tongue of Urdu, along with Hindi, and Arabic, and has just started learning a fifth language (his other mother-tongue), Farsi. Shariq is a Blue Belt in Taekwondo and, when not immersed in graduate work or teaching, he enjoys writing and loves to engage in health advocacy, political activism and sociocultural, religious, and political conversations.