Dr Terezinha Marta Castiñeiras is an Associate Professor of Infectious Diseases at the Universidade Federal do Rio de Janeiro (UFRJ) School of Medicine, Brazil. She is currently the Head of the Department of Preventive Medicine and Infectious Diseases.
Dr Castiñeiras received her medical degree (cum Laude, 1997) and completed her residency in Infectious Diseases (1990) in the University Hospital CFF/UFRJ, Rio. Immediately after, she worked as staff in the State Institute of Infectology, where she developed a special interest in meningitis. She completed her academic training receiving an MD studying Streptococcus pneumoniae meningitis and a PhD studying the molecular epidemiology of invasive Neisseria meningitis.
In 1993, she became a Professor of Infectious Diseases in UFRJ. Since then, she has been teaching, coordinating disciplines and residence programs and taking part in research projects. In 2009, she was appointed visitor scientist at the Infectious Diseases Epidemiology Research Unit, University of Pittsburgh School of Medicine, working in a Project of bacterial meningitis with a grant of NIH. Dr Castiñeiras has been author or co-author of impact-peer reviewed articles on these fields, national and international conference abstracts and guidelines and textbooks chapter.
In the fields of vaccinology and travel medicine, Dr Castiñeiras was a member of the group responsible for important innovations in Rio/Brazil. First, she was founding member of the first Public Adult Vaccination Center in Rio (CVA-UFRJ, 1996); second, she was founding member of the first health information centre for travellers in Brazil – Cives (1997). Also, she was a founding member of the Brazilian Society of Travel Medicine (SBMV), being the current President since January 2019. Additionally she is a member of ISTM, has the Certificate of Travel Health (CTH) and works part-time as academic coordinator, staff and preceptor at Health Information Center for Travelers (Cives-UFRJ).