Jessica Knight

Jessica Knight, PhD, is an Associate Professor and Graduate Coordinator in the Department of Epidemiology & Biostatistics at the University of Georgia's College of Public Health. Her research focuses on long-term outcomes of congenital heart disease, pediatric cardiac surgery, and health disparities in cardiovascular care. She leads large-scale studies like the CHD PULSE project, examining lifelong survivorship experiences among congenital heart disease patients.

Dr. Knight's work integrates epidemiological methods with clinical data to address critical gaps in understanding how demographic factors, geographic location, and medical interventions influence patient outcomes. Her recent studies explore rural-urban disparities in congenital heart surgery mortality and the impact of comorbid conditions like asthma on pediatric heart disease management.

Her research portfolio includes analysis of postoperative survival after congenital heart interventions, maternal-fetal outcomes in women with congenital heart defects, and biomarker development for delirium in aging populations. She has pioneered risk prediction models for pediatric cardiac arrest survival and contributed to improved staging systems for gastrointestinal cancers.

Dr. Knight has received the Outstanding Research Award in Pediatric Cardiology (2024) for her work linking rurality to post-surgery outcomes. She advises multiple national data consortia and collaborates with interdisciplinary teams across cardiology, public health, and biomedical engineering.