Rita Doumit, PhD, MPH, RN
Dr. Rita Doumit is an associate professor at Alice Ramez Chagoury School of Nursing. She joined LAU in 2009 since the early conception of the school as the first faculty member and contributed greatly to its establishment and development.
Education
- PhD, Loyola University Chicago, US
- MPH, American University of Beirut, Lebanon
- BSN, Illes de France, Paris, France
- BSN, Saint Joseph University, Beirut, Lebanon
Research Interests and Projects
Dr. Doumit has strong research interests in the promotion of healthy behaviors in adolescents, particularly in the areas of eating and stress. As a public health nurse, she has been interested in eating behavior and stress management for many reasons. Promoting healthy eating is crucial in light of the high obesity and eating disorders rates in the region and worldwide. Similarly, stress management has also been an integral part of public health and is receiving high regional consideration, given the political and economic turmoil in Lebanon and in the Middle Eastern region.
In 2018, Dr. Doumit led an intervention study funded by the World Health Organization (WHO) to promote healthy behaviors among adolescents. This project – a cognitive-behavioral skill-building healthy lifestyle program – helped youth by reducing their stress, anxiety, and depression levels, leading to reported increases in their quality of life.
Lately, with Lebanon’s limited strategy and resources on mental health, Dr. Doumit has joined forces with two LAU colleagues from the psychology department to design a two-year intervention program that offers emotional intelligence training for Lebanese youth. The team received a major grant of $185,000 from Grand Challenges Canada, funded by the National Institute for Health Research (NIHR), to implement this intervention for 600 vulnerable youth in public schools with accessible mental health resources.
Selected Publications
‡Doumit, R., *Habre, M., Abi Kharma, J. Davis, B. Health-Promoting Behaviors and Self-Efficacy among Nursing Students in a Context of High Political Uncertainty. (2022). Published in Worldviews Evidenced Based Nursing. DOI: 10.1111/wvn.12590.
‡Davis, B., Badr, L. & *Doumit, R. Health-Promoting Behaviors among American and Lebanese Nursing Students (January 2022). Accepted in Worldviews Evidenced Based Nursing.
‡Kazandjian, C., Militello, L. K. & *Doumit, R. (2020). Sex Differences on Quality of Life and Mental Health Outcomes when Using a Brief Cognitive‐Behavioral Skill Building Intervention with Adolescent Syrian Refugees: A Secondary Analysis. Accepted in Community Mental Health Journal. DOI: 10.1007/s10597-019-00453-1.
*Long, J. D., Dodd, S., Doumit, R., Boswell, C., O’Boyle, M., Rogers, T. & Hou, J. (October 2019). Neural Mechanisms and Behavioral Dimensions of Dietary Choice Revealed by fMRI: An Integrative Research Review. Accepted in Worldviews on Evidence-Based Nursing.
‡*Doumit, R., Kazandjian, C, & Militello, L. K. (November 2018). COPE for Adolescent Syrian Refugees in Lebanon: A Brief Cognitive‐Behavioral Skill Building Intervention to Improve Quality of Life and Promote Positive Mental Health. Accepted in Clinical Nursing Research. DOI: 10.1177/1054773818808114.