Dr. Cathy Backinger is Chief of the Tobacco Control Research Branch (TCRB) of the Behavioral Research Program in NCI’s Division of Cancer Control and Population Sciences (DCCPS). As Chief, she provides overall leadership for TCRB tobacco-related initiatives and research, as well as dissemination of evidence-based findings to prevent, treat, and control tobacco use.

Dr. Backinger has led efforts to coordinate NIH-supported research to increase the use of science in international, national and local tobacco control efforts. In 2006, she served as program chair for the NIH State-of-the-Science Conference on Tobacco Use: Prevention, Cessation and Control.

Dr. Backinger joined NCI in 1998 as a health scientist with TCRB and served as a scientific program director for the development and implementation of extramural behavioral and public health research programs in prevention and cessation of tobacco use by youth. She organized and chaired national meetings from 1999 to 2004 specifically addressing youth tobacco prevention, treatment, policy, and media research.

Prior to joining NCI, Dr. Backinger was Director of the Issues Management Staff in the Office of Surveillance and Biometrics, Center for Devices and Radiological Health, Food and Drug Administration. She has also worked at the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) and the Ohio Department of Health. While at CDC, Dr. Backinger worked on smokeless tobacco issues and developed and evaluated a smokeless tobacco prevention curriculum for Alaska Native schoolchildren.
She received a Ph.D. in health policy from the University of Maryland, Baltimore County, an M.P.H. from the University of Michigan and a B.S. in health education from Ohio State University.